


Your Secret Admirer

by 1ucky1ucy



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-11
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-01-16 04:54:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 43,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12335874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1ucky1ucy/pseuds/1ucky1ucy
Summary: Soonyoung has a crush on the music student. Soonyoung writes his crush secret admirer letters. Soonyoung gets an unexpected outcome.





	1. Your Secret Admirer 1

**Author's Note:**

> Someone I follow on tumblr said there isn't enough stories of this otp, so I started thinking of ideas. And this happened. Initially this was supposed to be something short, but who knows where this story will end up...
> 
> Cross posted on AFF.

Soonyoung stood frozen in front of a desk. This wasn't just any random desk though. The desk in front of him belonged to the boy he was crushing on. He looked down at the letter he had in his hand and thought about what he wanted to do.

Just place the letter down. It was as easy as that. Once it was on the desk, the first step was done. Once he had the first step done, and was out of the classroom, he could worry about the next step. Which was knowing his crush would be reading his letter.

Closing his eyes, Soonyoung tilted his head all the way back. He opened his eyes and looked at the ceiling. He had written and rewritten the hand written confession many times that night trying to get it right. How were you to say that you've been crushing and dreaming about someone for the last year? Especially when the only contact they shared throughout that whole year was the few random times Soonyoung purposely accidentally bumped into his crush.

Exhaling, Soonyoung smoothed out any wrinkles from the envelope and placed it on the desk. Nothing was written on the envelope except for the initials of his crush.

Nothing happened in the following week. But of course that was to be expected, Soonyoung didn’t give his name. He had signed it as “your secret admirer.” 

In his bag was letter number two. Soonyoung had spent so many nights sleepless with a clouded mind, tossing and turning, he never woke up early enough. Every morning, when his mother came in to wake him up, Soonyoung screamed out in agony realizing how late he was. 

Now it was the weekend and he had to wait for Monday to come around. He didn’t mind, it gave him the chance to go and stalk the musical genius, Woozi, on his youtube. Soonyoung sat in front of his computer and clicked on video after video. Even though he’s seen all of them many times, he couldn’t get enough. Each video had it’s own unique quality, and Soonyoung found himself lost for hours in them.

Somehow there was a rumor, of Woozi attending their school, circulating the student body. And it was what made Soonyoung go back to the videos, wondering if he had ever bumped into the boy. No one knew who Woozi was in real life, or what he looked like. In every video Woozi posted, he had donned on a different mask. There was only one video, where Woozi wore a masquerade mask, showing off the bottom half of his face .

Soonyoung was watching the video now, studying Woozi’s lips. He squinted and tilted his head in wonder. Who could he be? 

 

On Monday morning Soonyoung was up bright and early, astonishing his parents. They were delighted with the thought of how much Soonyoung wanted to go learn something. Only, they didn’t know how much Soonyoung wanted to go send his second letter. He quickly ate whatever breakfast his mother put in front of him, bid his parents a good day, and ran off for school.

Spriting like a madman, Soonyoung reached the desk in record time. Although... he had to crouch over it, holding on to it for dear life, while he calmed his breathing down. When he could stand up again, without feeling like he would throw up his breakfast, Soonyoung brought out the letter. He took it between his palms and place it in front of his face. Quickly praying that his crush would read this one as well, he placed it on the desk and ran out of the room.

How was Soonyoung sure that his crush would be getting the letters? He had overheard what the boy’s first class of the day was. Then he had come early to find out when the boy reached class, happily noting how his crush was always first in class. It made leaving the letter easier. From there he started plotting his secret admirer plan.

 

Soonyoung was literally dancing in the clouds for the rest of the week. Even though he didn’t know how his crush was reacting to the letters, he felt accomplished. He had confessed and was telling everything he wanted to the boy he liked.

“Are you okay?” Jun asked him.

Soonyoung looked over at his friend and smiled, “Everything is amazing. I have amazing friends, I have amazing parents, and I am in love with an amazing person.”

Jun exhaled, almost sick with his friend’s actions, “You finally confessed?”

“I wrote a letter to him!” Soonyoung said, leaning against Jun.

“He knows it’s you sending the letters? Cause I haven’t seen you guys talking to each other...” Jun asks.

Soonyoung cups his blushing cheeks, “I’m his secret admirer.”

“Soonyoung,” Jun groaned, “That is so gross.”

Soonyoung chuckled, hiding behind his hands. He was too happy with how his life was at the moment. Nothing could ruin it.

 

To keep the letters consistent, Soonyoung decided to wait for Monday again to send his third letter. He didn’t want to be too eager with the process. Being hidden from his crush was enjoyable. The tables had turned, Soonyoung giggled with this thought, his crush knew he liked him but he didn’t know it was Soonyoung. It used to only be Soonyoung in this one-sided relationship, but now his crush knew about him.

Leaving his third letter, Soonyoung skipped out of the class. 

“So,” Jun said, sitting next to Soonyoung, “You sent the third one?”

“Yup!” Soonyoung said, enjoying his lunch.

“He isn’t showing much of a reaction,” Jun said as he looked over to a group of people. 

Soonyoung turned his head in the same direction and noticed the group of musical students. He tuned his vision to one person in particular and smiled. The group laughed out loud at a joke that must have been said, and Soonyoung chuckled along. Jun’s face fell in disgust, shaking his head with disbelief.

“He knows someone here, in this school, likes him,” Soonyoung said with a grin, “And that is the part I’m sure he likes best.”

 

When Monday rolled around, Soonyoung was confident with his fourth letter. He was up early, filled with breakfast, and the stroll to school was pleasant. Everything, for the last few weeks, was perfect. Soonyoung knew this week would be perfect as well.

Soonyoung hummed as he walked up to the desk. He was so happy in thought that he didn’t even notice the little note on the desk. Singing, he pulled the envelope out of its place in his bag. He was about to place his own letter down when he finally saw it. A piece of paper was folded in half, and laying on the desk he had visited for the last three Mondays.

He froze. 

This was something he was not expecting. 

Picking up the note, Soonyoung left his own letter. He walked out of the classroom dazed. Not daring to read the note till he was safely alone, Soonyoung left for the rooftop.

Only then did he sit down and look at the note. On the outside, neat handwriting wrote: to, secret admirer.

Soonyoung’s heart was racing. His crush had decided to respond to him. Blood drained from his face. Soonyoung didn’t know if this would be a good thing or a bad thing. 

Opening up the paper, Soonyoung gazed the length before reading the note. Again the neat handwriting could be seen, but not much was written on the note. 

“let’s meet

under the cherry tree

4pm”

Soonyoung couldn’t believe it. His crush wanted to meet up with him. Again, he was frozen in shock. Nothing, but his fast beating heart, could be heard. He couldn’t believe it. All the letters, and courage to finally make a move, was paying off. He had been given the chance to talk to his crush.

Only when the five minute bell warning went off did Soonyoung come back to reality. Inhaling, Soonyoung got up from the floor and ran towards his first class. 

Not once, during the whole day, did Soonyoung’s heart slow down. He wasn’t sure if he was excited or worried to the nth degree about meeting his crush. What if he didn’t like Soonyoung back? What if he wanted to meet up to tell him to stop writing to him? How did this happen? Soonyoung was so happy earlier, and now he was a ball of nervous reck.

“Dude,” Jun said, blinking at the pale Soonyoung, “What happened to you?”

“He wrote back,” Soonyoung told him, holding onto his upset stomach.

“Shouldn’t you be happy?” Jun asked.

“Should I?” Soonyoung wondered out loud.

Jun smacked his friend’s head lightly, “It’s everything you’ve been waiting for. You’ve always been the cheerful, bright, optimistic guy, don’t lose that part of yourself now. I’m sure he’ll be glad to know who you are.”

Soonyoung smiled at his friend’s words. With that, Soonyoung’s heart lighten up. Jun was right, no matter what happened, he would be fine. 

 

The school wasn’t only known for a rumor of youtube star Woozi in their attendance, they were also known for the lone cherry tree in their yard. No one knows who planted it, but it was there. Ever since the sudden appearance of the tree, a popular legend was born with it. Any relationship started there had two certain outcome. One being a long happy relationship, the other being a short unhappy time with breakups in the end.

Soonyoung tried not to worry about it too much. What they were doing was not starting anything, they were just meeting up for the first time. 

15 minutes early, an anxious Soonyoung was standing under the cherry tree. He didn’t want to look to eager, but in the end he didn’t care. Soonyoung liked the guy, he might as well show how much he liked him.

He wasn’t sure which way his crush would be showing up, so he just waited. Out of nervousness, he grabbed his phone and placed his earplugs into his ears. Soonyoung tapped on the youtube app and looked up Woozi. Listening to Woozi always calmed him down.

Paying attention to the youtube star made the sound of feet walking up to Soonyoung go unnoticed. Even a quiet “Uhm,” from the voice behind him went unnoticed.

Finally, a poke to his back made Soonyoung notice the time. Seeing the 4:02 on the top of the right screen, Soonyoung’s eyes widen. Knowing who was poking him made his eye’s widen even more. Quickly, he pulled the earplugs out and stuffed them into his pockets.

Turning around with a pounding heart and wide smile, Soonyoung faced his crush. Yet, the moment they faced each other Soonyoung’s smiled fell. The person standing in front of him wasn’t his crush.

“Jihoon?” Soonyoung said, staring at the boy.

Jihoon looked at him with an inexpressive face, “I’ve been receiving your letters.”


	2. Your Secret Admirer 2

Soonyoung blinked, unsure of what was going on. “You-you’ve been getting my letters?”

“Yeah,” Jihoon said, with a smirk playing on his lips, “The ones you’ve been leaving for Wonwoo. I’ve been receiving them. You should have been more careful. Made sure the letter actually fell into the right hands.”

Blood drained from Soonyoung’s body, and a cold sweat crept over his arms. “You took my letters, and read them?”

Jihoon nodded, arms crossed. With a scrunched up face and squinty judgmental eyes, he said, “I did take them, also read all of them too. I could tell it was you, writing them, right away.”

“You don’t even know who I am,” Soonyoung said, defensively.

“But I do know you, Soonyoung,” Jihoon said, shaking his head, “You smile too loud and you laugh too contagiously. Your best friend is Jun, and you’re both part of the dance team.”

Soonyoung’s heart painfully pounded against his chest. Why was the kid doing this to him? They were from two different sides of the world. And this shouldn’t have happened. The secluded artist had never spoken to him before. Soonyoung didn’t know anything about Jihoon, other than the fact that his art pieces were the talk of the art hallways. 

“If you knew they were meant for Wonwoo, then why did you take them and read them?” Soonyoung said through gritted teeth. 

Jihoon brought up his right hand and tapped his lips, “Okay, so I can see how it can be a bit disrespectful, but I was honestly doing Wonwoo a favor in not letting him see those letters.” Jihoon paused, thinking about his choice of words, before continuing. “There were many other reasons, but the biggest reason is because you are not going to go out with Wonwoo.”

Soonyoung frowned at Jihoon’s words, “Who are you to tell me who I can and can’t go out with?”

Standing his ground, Soonyoung didn’t back away as Jihoon walked up to him. As Jihoon was shorter, he grabbed Soonyoung’s collar and pulled him down. Soonyoung’s heart angrily pounded at the thought of what Jihoon was doing to him. He was too furious to make a move against Jihoon, letting his ears be whispered into.

“I,” Jihoon whispered in final statement, “Am going to be your worst nightmare. I’m going to tell everyone we’re dating. And you’re not going to chase after some puppy crush anymore. You are mine.”

Jihoon pulled back from Soonyoung’s ear to stare at him in the eyes. Soonyoung stared back wide eyed. 

What was going on here? Soonyoung didn’t know how to respond, waiting to be let go.

“Do you understand?” Jihoon glared at the quiet Soonyoung.

“I-i... You?” Soonyoung managed to get out before turning his head slightly at the confusion going on in his mind.

“He really is hopeless,” Jihoon mumbled, more to himself than to Soonyoung.

“Why am I your’s?” Soonyoung squeaked out in a pout.

Jihoon sighed, closing his eyes briefly. He looked Soonyoung straight in his eyes before he pulled Soonyoung back down to his level.

Soonyoung allowed himself to be pulled down again. Jihoon was surprisingly strong for a smaller guy and it didn’t take much for Soonyoung to figure it was pointless to fight against it. Only, there was something different this time. Jihoon didn’t pull Soonyoung down to whisper orders into his ears.

Jihoon pulled down on Soonyoung’s collar and connected their lips. Soonyoung initially figured the shorter boy would be harsh towards him, and for the first few seconds it was nothing but harsh. Jihoon forced their lips to stay connected. Once Soonyoung didn’t pull away, Jihoon carefully moved against his unmoving lips. 

_ I’m kissing Jihoon... No, I’m being kissed by Jihoon! _ Soonyoung thought as he felt soft lips against his. His heart was rising up higher as he was finding it very hard to pull away. No, instead of moving away like he should have, he found himself moving his lips to match Jihoon’s.

With closed eyes, Soonyoung kissed Jihoon back. He unconsciously brought up his hands and placed them on Jihoon’s chest. In the small moment, where Soonyoung allowed himself enjoy the intimate moment, he had forgotten all about Wonwoo and his letters. 

Then he realized where his hands were and who he was kissing. Pushing on Jihoon’s chest, he separated them apart. Jihoon staggered back, not losing his footing.

“What the heck was that?” Soonyoung angrily hissed out as he wiped his lips on his sleeves.

Jihoon grinned, “I’m just telling you why you are mines. Or would you like a reminder of how you kissed me back?”

“I don’t know what you’re thinking, but stay away from me. I don’t want anything to do with you,” Soonyoung tells the boy.

“We’ll see about that,” Jihoon said as he lightly licked his bottom lips with a smile.

Soonyoung grimaced and walked away. He had had enough of Jihoon.

 

There was only one person Soonyoung wanted to see right now. Spiriting the familiar path, he rushed passed his own house towards Jun’s place.

Soonyoung needed to talk to his best friend. He needed to get his head in order. How could he let Jihoon take over him like that? And most importantly, Wonwoo still didn’t know who he was or that he had a crush on him.

As he had done many times before, he let himself into Jun’s home. Jun’s mother gave him a spare key when she decided she had opened the door for him too many times. Mrs. Wen was in the livingroom when Soonyoung bursted through the front door.

“Soonyoung?” Mrs. Wen said in shock.

“Mrs. Wen. Good to see you. Jun’s in his room?” Soonyoung asked as he moved in the direction of his friend’s room, not really giving Mrs. Wen the chance to answer.

“Jun is in there, but Soonyoung, Ming-”

He didn’t hear the rest as he bolted up the stairs out of earshot.

Not even stopping to knock on the door, Soonyoung turned the knob and flung the door open, letting himself in. Once he was in, something felt wrong. Jun wasn’t laying on his bed reading, or sitting by his desk playing games. He was standing in the middle of room with someone else.

Jun was hidden behind someone, lost in whatever they were doing. And Soonyoung couldn’t decide what was happening before him. Was his friend kissing someone?! Or were they telling a secret that required them to lean in so close, with his eyes closed, and his hands on the other boy’s waist?

Jun’s head was tilted enough to open up and look at Soonyoung. With wide eyes he pulled back from the person standing in front of him. “Soonyoung?”

“Oh Myah!” Soonyoung said out loud, turning to give his friend privacy, “I’m so sorry. I should have knocked. I can leave.”

What kind of day was this? Soonyoung couldn’t believe his luck. This was supposed to be another perfect week, why was so many weird things happening?

Soonyoung felt like he could cry. He really did. He had to hold it in as he waited for Jun to tell him what to do.

“Soonyoung,” Jun said from behind him, “Don’t go.”

He closed his eyes and turned around, “Are you sure?”

Jun sighed, “You can open your eyes. I’m sorry it had to happen like this. I was planning on telling you.”

Soonyoung opened his eyes and looked to his best friend. Jun stood there, holding hands with the foreign exchange student.

“Minghao?” Soonyoung said in shock.

Minghao nervously smiled at him, waving as he said, “Uh, hi hyung.”

“Close the door, will you?” Jun said as he pulled Minghao to sit on the bed.

Soonyoung followed the order, closing the door. Once they were shut off from the rest of the household, Soonyoung took the computer chair for himself. He turned to Jun and Minghao and couldn’t believe it.

“You guys are... When did this... How..?” Soonyoung tried to start, but he couldn’t finish each of the sentences.

Jun smiled with a slight shake of his head, “If you weren’t so invested in your letters, you would have known I was helping Minghao adjust to school life here in Korea. One thing lead to another and we’ve been kind of a couple since last week.”

Minghao frowned and pouted, “What do you mean “kind of a couple”? Is that all I am to you?”

Jun grinned as he closed his eyes and leaned on Minghao, “You’re my Minghao. Only... you haven’t agreed to go out with me yet, all you want from me is kisses.”

Soonyoung grimaced at his friend’s words, “Jun, really? You were calling me gross a week back but look at you now.”

“Yeah, get off me,” Minghao said as he pushed Jun away from him. They still didn’t let go of each other's hand though and that’s all that mattered to Jun. Jun smiled at Minghao’s antics.

“Soonyoung,” Jun said to his friend, giving him attention now, “What are you doing here anyway? I thought you had a meeting with Wonwoo.”

Soonyoung stood up, remembering why he had rushed to his friend’s in the first place. “Ahh, that’s right. I came here to tell you about that. It wasn’t Wonwoo who was getting my letters.”

“Sit down and tell me what is going on,” Jun tells his overwhelmed friend.

Sitting back down, Soonyoung continued, “Wonwoo hasn’t been getting my letters. It was that weird art student, Jihoon.”

“Jihoon?” Jun asked in shock, “His art is on all the walls of the school.”

Soonyoung nodded his head in a hurry, “Yeah, that Jihoon. He showed up to meet me. He is so creepy. He told me how he had been taking all my letters and how it was better if Wonwoo never found out about me. Then... then.. He... He..”

Jun scoffed, “Soonyoung, calm down and tell me what he did.”

Quickly, before he could regret saying anything, Soonyoung got it all off his chest, “He told me that he and I were going to be together cause I’m his now or something like, then he kissed me and oh my God, Jun, I kissed him back. I kissed Jihoon! Then I pulled away and told him to leave me alone and ran away.”

Jun blinked away, trying to understand what he had just heard. 

But it was Minghao, who had broken the silence, “Hyung, you kissed Jihoon?”

Soonyoung groaned and brought his head down between his knee. 

“Does he like you?” Jun asked with a frown, “Why would he be doing all of this?”

“I don’t know,” Soonyoung whined, sitting up straight, “He’s so strange. I just wanted to talk to Wonwoo but now things are so messed up. Like why did this happen to me? This is karma isn’t it? I was too happy so something had to happen to screw me over.”

Jun sighed as he let go of Minghao’s hand. He walks over to a glassy eyed Soonyoung and hugs his friend. He pulls Soonyoung’s upper half towards him and pats his back.

Soonyoung ends up holding onto Jun’s middle, feeling like a small child. He buries his face into Jun’s shirt and knows that his friend wouldn’t mind the small wetness. Everything that had building up to this point had felt like a lie. The fact that Wonwoo hadn’t been getting the letters, the fact that it turns out someone else had been taking them, the fact that it was Jihoon’s doing, the meeting, everything about it was just wrong. 

“Maybe this is just a sign that you should talk to Wonwoo. Up straight, instead of letters, no matter how nice and sweet the idea was,” Jun said, pulling away from a drained Soonyoung.

Soonyoung frowned and asked, “You really think so?”

Jun nodded, “It’s time he knows.”

“What about Jihoon-hyung?” Minghao asks from behind Jun. Soonyoung leans over and looks at Minghao, almost forgetting that he was also in the room.

Jun turns around and walks back to sit down on the bed. “We’ll just have to wait and see what happens with that kid. All we can do is wait for tomorrow to come.”

“You should just tell Wonwoo, hyung,” Minghao tells Soonyoung, “You never know, he might like you back and you don’t want to miss out on that opportunity.”

Jun turns to Minghao and said, “What about us and our missed opportunity? Soonyoung knows about us, my mom knows about us, we think your mom knows about us. Why don’t we know?”

Minghao pouts, “Do we really have to label this right now? I like where we’re at.”

Soonyoung stares between the two and couldn’t believe the conversation he was hearing. Did they forget he was sitting right in front of them, witnessing the whole thing?

“Minghao, we have to label this. I can’t keep kissing my friend. I want us to be together as a couple. What is so wrong with that? Why can’t I be the one who you call your boyfriend?”

Both Jun and Soonyoung watch as Minghao gets off the bed. Soonyoung notices that Jun grimaces at the movement. He was curious, yet he knew it wasn’t the time to ask about it.

“I think I should go now. I can’t talk about this right now,” Minghao said as he let himself out.

Jun sighs and lays on his bed. His fist pounds into his bed in frustration.

“Jun,” Soonyoung manages to whisper.

“Soonyoung-ah,” Jun said to his friend, “Why does everything have to be so hard? I know we’ll be okay tomorrow, since I’ll call him later tonight. Yet right now I don’t know why I put up with this.”

“You like him a lot, don’t you?” Soonyoung asked his friend.

Jun covered his eyes with his arm and sighed, “You don’t even know.”

 

The next day Soonyoung rolled off of his bed and crawled out of his room to the bathroom. He didn’t know how many hours of sleep he got. All night he worried about Wonwoo. And when he didn’t have Wonwoo on the mind, all he could think about was Jihoon. Soonyoung didn’t know what to do.

For the rest of the day, Soonyoung was restless. He couldn’t help but be on the lookout for Jihoon at every corner of the school’s halls. Thankfully, Soonyoung didn’t bump into him all morning. But he did catch glimpses of Wonwoo every now and then. Every time he did, he would clam up and run away in the other direction.

After lunch they still had time before they needed to be in class. Jun and Minghao were okay again, and Soonyoung knew enough to just leave their relationship status alone for now. Soonyoung was sitting on top the table, feet on the bench meant for sitting, while his two friends were standing in front of him.

They were talking about the end of the year talent show. The prize for the winner is going to be a camera, and Soonyoung really wanted it.

“So I was thinking,” Jun said to Soonyoung, “We should add Minghao to our group. He’s pretty good at dancing, you have to see before you decide. But I really do think we could win if he joins. We’re not in it for the prize, we know you want it, but we just really want to dance.”

“Yeah, hyung, it would be an honor to dance with you on stage,” Minghao added. 

Soonyoung looked between the two and nodded, “Okay.”

He really didn’t mind. If Jun thought Minghao was good then there was no questioning it.

Before the two before him could get excited, someone decided to join their group. Jihoon walks in the room, unannounced, and goes right up to Soonyoung. While Soonyoung just stares and blinks at the sudden appearance. Jihoon stands in front of Soonyoung, moves Soonyoung’s legs, turns around and sits down right in front of him.

Jihoon doesn’t even greet Soonyoung, as he looked up to Soonyoung’s friends. “So, what are we talking about?”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but stare at his friends in confusion, wondering what the hell Jihoon was up to.


	3. Your Secret Admirer 3

Soonyoung was looking to his friends for help. He frowned and gestured to his friends at what he should do in the position he had been put in.

Jihoon, who he had literally just met the day before, was sitting between his legs. And to make matters worse, Jihoon was talking to his friends as if he had known them for forever.

Minghao, who had just transferred and despite hearing about the whole situation the day before as well, shrugged and said, “We’re joining the talent show.”

“Dancing, right?” Jihoon asked.

Jun was staring between the three people around him. He looked flustered at who he should be keeping up with. Minghao was tugging at his sleeve, while Jihoon looked at the couple with expectations, and Soonyoung stared with pleading desperate eyes.

No one said anything. Minghao looked at Soonyoung and Jun, and decided it was best not to talk to Jihoon anymore. Soonyoung was looking at him with a pout, and saw how confused Minghao was, as if he shouldn’t have told Jihoon about the talent show.

Soonyoung looked down at the head in front of him, and saw Jihoon looking from Jun to Minghao. What was this person doing? Soonyoung couldn’t believe how far Jihoon was going to try to incorporate himself into his life.

“Sorry Jihoon,” Jun said, finally the one to speak up after the long pause, “I think you should leave. You’re not welcomed here.”

“Hmmm,” Jihoon hummed while staring at Jun, “You aren’t too surprised by my appearance, so you must know of me. That alone tells me I am welcomed here. And if you must know, I’m with Soonyoung.”

Soonyoung’s face contorted with shock and disgust. He looked to his friends and shook his head in disagreement. Jun and Minghao glanced at him and looked back down to Jihoon. Soonyoung couldn’t believe the lies Jihoon was feeding to his friends. 

“Even if you are  _ with _ Soonyoung. You’re not welcomed here. You should leave.” Jun said, sighing.

Soonyoung grimaced at the words of his friend. The situation he had somehow created was making Jun become angry and frustrated. He never wanted Jun to be mad. He shook his head and knew he had to deal with Jihoon, he had to get rid of the guy. Jihoon was not only stirring up his life, he was also messing with Jun and Minghao’s.

“Jihoon,” Soonyoung whispered, “We need to talk.”

Jun and Minghao snap their head up to look at him with shock.

Soonyoung looks to his friends and calms them down, saying, “Don’t worry.”

Jihoon had kept quiet, but hearing Soonyoung direct his words to him, he slowly got up and turned to Soonyoung. “Yeah, I agree. We do need to talk.”

Soonyoung sees the smirk on Jihoon’s lips and wonders what he is in for today. Jihoon reaches towards Soonyoung, and Soonyoung leans back. He didn’t want to be touched by Jihoon, it only reminded him of what had happened the day before.

Soonyoung was worried that Jihoon was going for his face, but his necktie was grabbed instead. Jihoon pulled on Soonyoung’s tie and proceeded to drag Soonyoung out of the lunch room. Soonyoung stumbled off the table and widened his eyes towards Jun.

Jun shrugged and rolled his eyes. It was clear on Jun’s face, and how he didn’t make a move, that Soonyoung was alone in this now. 

Following Jihoon, they didn’t stop till they reached a deserted hallway. And even away from everyone else, Jihoon had not let go of Soonyoung’s tie. Jihoon turned to Soonyoung, who was leaning away from him, and smirked.

“What did you want to tell me?” Jihoon asked.

“Let go of my tie first,” Soonyoung said, grimacing. “I’m not a dog.”

Jihoon went quiet as he thought about what Soonyoung said. After a quick moment, he pulled Soonyoung down as he leaned up.

Soonyoung closed his eyes, tightening his lips, scared they would be touched again. Once he felt a small breath of air on his neck, his eyes opened.

Jihoon whispered to him, “You are right, you’re not a dog. 

The hold on his tie loosened and Soonyoung steps back from Jihoon. Jihoon places his hands in his pants pockets.

“Whatever this is that you are doing, I want you to stay away from my friends,” Soonyoung tells Jihoon with a sigh. “They don’t deserve you bothering them.”

Jihoon grinned, looking up at Soonyoung, “You’re not telling me to stay away from you though.”

Soonyoung huffed, saying, “It’s not like I can stop you at this point.”

“So you’ve realized I’m going to be a big part of your life,” Jihoon said, his grin widening.

“Only till I can get away from this school and you,” Soonyoung said in whisper.

Jihoon chuckled, “As long as you’re alive, Soonyoung, I’m always going to be next to you.”

Soonyoung’s eyes widened at Jihoon’s statement. His heartbeat quickened and his face flushed. Not wanting Jihoon to see anymore of what he was doing to him, Soonyoung yelled, “Do whatever you want!”

Turning away from Jihoon, Soonyoung runs away to hide in his next class.

 

“You need to talk to Wonwoo,” Jun was saying to Soonyoung.

School was done, and the pair of best friends were over at Soonyoung’s place. They were half doing homework, and half not doing homework.

“What am I supposed to say?” Soonyoung asked.

“I don’t know,” Jun shrugged, before giving suggestions, “I’ve liked you for a year, can we get to know each other better, I want to be friends maybe more than friends.”

“Wha- What if he doesn’t even like me?” Soonyoung frowned.

“You’ll never know if you don’t ask, Soonyoung,” Jun tells his friend.

“Can you do it for me?” Soonyoung asked with a pout.

Jun scoffed, rolling his eyes, “No.”

Soonyoung sulked while nodding, “That’s what I expected.”

Still sulking at the thought of confessing to Wonwoo, Soonyoung poked at his paper with his pencil. He wasn’t in the mood for homework.

Letting his gaze raise to his friend, Soonyoung smiled at the serious look Jun had on. “Junnie Jun.”

Jun frowned and looked over to Soonyoung, “What’s wrong with you now?”

“How are things going with you and Minghao?”

“Minghao?” Jun asked back 

“Yeah, you know, the guy you keep kissing, he’s also in our dance team now. Xu Minghao,” Soonyoung said.

Jun sighed, throwing down his pencil, “I know who Minghao is. But why do you ask?”

Soonyoung blinks at his friend, “We’re friends. I’m taking an interest in your life. I want to know if you’re happy, so I can be happy with you. And if you are sad, I can be sad with you too. So which one is it?”

“Right now,” Jun said shrugging, “it is still the same as it was before. I am sad he doesn’t want to label us, but happy that I am the only one he wants to be with. It sucks though, I feel as if I will never know what kind of future I will have with him.”

Soonyoung goes quiet with Jun had just told him. And seeing as how quiet he was, Jun went back to his homework. He had to take all the chances of quiet he could get, otherwise he would never get his homework done.

Before Jun could get too deep into his work, Soonyoung had one last comment to make. “Maybe, just maybe, Minghao is scared of the future as well. And maybe that is what makes him not want to label anything.”

 

After having a long night to think about it, Soonyoung had made his final decision. He was going to ask Wonwoo out. There was no other choice. He had to tell Wonwoo about his feelings. Soonyoung knew himself well enough to know his heart and mind would be torn if he didn’t let Wonwoo know.

Soonyoung was going to do it after all their classes had ended. He knew Wonwoo’s schedule well enough to know where he would be at the end of the day. Even if his crush was surrounded by his friends, Soonyoung had to tell him.

It was lunch time, and Soonyoung quietly sat across his friends, as they both wrote notes to each other in a notebook. He wanted to ask what Jun and Minghao were up to, but he didn’t want to bother their communication. Plus, Soonyoung was sure they were tired of him after he had pounced them to figure out a schedule to practice their dance routine.

Even though it had been only three days, Soonyoung didn’t flinch when Jihoon shows up with his lunch in hand. Jun and Minghao stops their writing momentarily to watch as Jihoon sits down next to Soonyoung and starts eating his meal. 

“Soonyoung,” Jun says, getting the attention of his friend.

Soonyoung looks up from his food to Jun, “Yes?”

Jun side eyed Jihoon, who was slowly eating his food, “Is everything okay here?”

Soonyoung finally looked over to Jihoon, then back to Jun. He shrugs and tells his friend, “Yeah, everything's fine.”

Jun nods in understanding and smiles to Minghao. Without further distractions, the two go back to writing their notes to each other. 

There was nothing Soonyoung really could do, in the situation of having Jihoon place himself in his life. All he could really do was keep going, and hopefully Jihoon would catch the hint that he wasn’t wanted or needed around.

Once Soonyoung was done with his food, Jihoon placed his spoon down. Looking over to Soonyoung, Jihoon asked, “You’re done eating?”

With a small nod, Soonyoung tells him, “My plate is empty.”

“Good,” Jihoon said, standing up and away from the table. “Let’s clean up and leave. I need to talk to you.”

Soonyoung looks at Jihoon’s half full plate, “You’re not done with your food.”

“It’s fine,” Jihoon said, picking up his plate, “I’m full enough.”

“Why can’t we talk here,” Soonyoung asked, still not getting up.

“We’re not to bother your friends,” Jihoon said in final statement, “And it looks like they are busy as it is.”

Jun stops his writing and looks over to Soonyoung, “We can stop writing if it bothers you guys.”

Soonyoung shook his head, “No, it seems important, whatever you guys are working on. If this talk with Jihoon doesn’t take long I’ll be back, otherwise I’ll talk to you guys later. Okay?”

Without looking away from Soonyoung, Jun nods. There was worry in his face, and Soonyoung didn’t like to see that, “It’s fine Jun, I can take care of myself.”

Jihoon, still holding his plate waiting for Soonyoung, says, “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t dare hurt a hair on Soonyoung’s head.”

“Just keep writing, I’ll be fine,” Soonyoung tells his friends as he gets up.

Taking his plate, Jihoon leads them to the drop off of their dirty plates. After cleaning up, Jihoon leads him to the hallway they were in yesterday. 

Soonyoung didn’t care enough to worry about what Jihoon wanted. He never knew what the art kid wanted, and guessing was never good enough.

Stopping close to where they were yesterday, Jihoon stood in front of Soonyoung.

“What did you want to talk about?” Soonyoung asked, looking down at the glaring Jihoon.

And instead of answering, Jihoon walks forward, backing him into the wall.

“Ji-Jihoon, what are you doing?” Soonyoung stutters out, unaware of what he should do in this kind of situation.

But Jihoon doesn’t stop. He pins both his arms on the wall, barricading Soonyoung in. Without answering the flustered Soonyoung, Jihoon places his forehead on Soonyoung’s chest.

With his fast beating heart, Soonyoung stays in his position. The always confident Jihoon was quiet and small in front of him.

“What’s wrong?” Soonyoung asked, “Is everything okay Jihoon?”

“I’m not going to lose you to him,” Jihoon says finally.

Soonyoung sighs, placing his hands on Jihoon’s shoulder to push him away, “You need to stop this.”

“No matter what,” Jihoon says, lifting his head to look Soonyoung in the eye, “You’re going to be mine in the end.”

“Jihoon,” Soonyoung said, shaking his head.

Lifting his hand to caress Soonyoung’s cheeks, Jihoon smirks, “You’ll see. No one is more perfect for you than me, and no one is better for me than you.”

Soonyoung walks out of Jihoon’s reach, “I think this is enough for today. I can’t do anymore of this today.”

Without looking back, Soonyoung tries to drown out Jihoon’s words, but they still come, “You can keep running Soonyoung, but one day you won’t be running anymore.”

 

Despite the conversation Soonyoung had with Jihoon, he still planned to go on with telling Wonwoo about his feelings. Pushing away all the frustrations Jihoon had given him, he thinks of the boy who had filled his heart and mind for the last year.

Other than Wonwoo, there was no one else Soonyoung had eyes for. He knew for a fact how wonderful they would be together. They would be grossly cute, like Jun and Minghao, writing love notes to each other. Together, they could talk about their shared love of music. Soonyoung had dreamed of hearing their laughs and giggles mixed together, and wanted so badly to have them sharing inside jokes and secrets. 

He wanted all this with only one other person, Jeon Wonwoo.

Soonyoung breathed out a nervous breath and watched as Wonwoo walked out of the music room alone. This was perfect. He waited as Wonwoo made his way closer to him. And when Wonwoo was close enough to hear him, he finally spoke up.

“Wonwoo,” Soonyoung said his name, “Is it okay if I had a word with you?”

Wonwoo blinked, looking around the hallway, confused, “You want a word with me?”

Nodding, Soonyoung said, “Yes.”

After a beat of consideration, Wonwoo nods as well, “Okay. What do you have to say to me?”

“I- I’m- My name is Kwon Soonyoung,” Soonyoung got out, “I’ve liked you for a while now, a year to be exact. And I- I wanted to ask if you want to go out with me.”

Wonwoo frowns, staying silent throughout the whole confession.

His quietness left Soonyoung flustered. He could already see the outcome now. His face flushed with embarrassed heat, knowing his heart was already hurting from the expected turn down.

“Are you serious?” Wonwoo asked Soonyoung.

Soonyoung’s face turns even redder than possible, “I’ve been wanting to tell you for a while now. I really like you.”

Another moment of quiet ensued. It made Soonyoung wonder if the best thing at the moment was to just walk away.

“Okay,” Wonwoo replied finally.


	4. Your Secret Admirer 4

Soonyoung was laid out on Jun’s bed. He was there but he also wasn’t there. His mind was off into another world where everything was rainbows and sunshine, and there was a fountain of cold coke running 24/7.

“Remember to breath,” Jun tells his friend.

Flipping to his stomach, Soonyoung smiles to Jun, “I still cannot believe it. He said yes. Wonwoo agreed to go out with me.”

“You’ve told me many times now,” Jun said with a small smile, “And I’m going to tell you again, I’m super happy for you.”

Taking out his phone, Soonyoung stared at the blank screen, “Do you think it would be too early to be texting him?”

Shaking his head, Jun said, “No, you guys agreed to go out on a date. At the least, you guys need to figure out when that date is going to happen. I’m also sure you are dying to talk to him anyways.”

With little quick nods, Soonyoung sits up, turning on his screen. Jun was right. Even though he had exchanged phone numbers with Wonwoo earlier, they had yet to set up a date. And he didn’t want to wait to find Wonwoo again to figure out when they were going to be going out. Plus, Wonwoo knew of his feelings already, texting him first shouldn’t matter.

**Soonyoung: Hey there!**

**Wonwoo: I was wondering when you would be texting me ;)**

Giggles escaped Soonyoung’s lips, and Jun tsked while shaking his head.

**Soonyoung: You could have texted me first, forget all the waiting.**

**Wonwoo: I wasn’t sure if you were serious, it still feels all like a dream.**

Flipping over on the bed, Soonyoung laid on his stomach, kicking his feet in delight.

“Soonyoung,” Jun said to the excited boy, “That’s my bed you’re kicking with your dirty feet.”

Soonyoung didn’t reply as he stopped and went back to texting Wonwoo.

**Soonyoung: So, I was wondering when our date would be. Unless you would like me to plan something, since I did ask you out.**

His heart beated fast as he waited for Wonwoo’s reply. Soonyoung was hoping for something to move forward their relationship. And having a date with just them would help them get to know each other better.

**Wonwoo: There’s actually an event I want to take you to, if you don’t mind.**

**Soonyoung: I would love to go with you, no matter what it is, as long as we’re together.**

**Wonwoo: You’re tooo sweet >.< Every Friday there is a talent show thrown by the cafe owned by the school, and my friends and I hang out there almost all night. It be cool for you to meet them.**

Okay, Soonyong would take what he could get. Even if his friends were there, Wonwoo would be there too. And it was an official first date between them. It was all that mattered.

**Soonyoung: It’s a date :)**

**Wonwoo: I can’t wait ;)**

 

The next day Soonyoung was with Jun, standing outside of the school’s building waiting for Minghao. School had been let out for a while now, and lingering students were long gone. Minghao had to stay late to talk to a teacher, and Jun was willing to wait. Since Soonyoung had no plans other than to practice with the two later anyways, he waited with Jun.

“There are rumors,” Jun said, sighing as he looked over to his friend.

“Of?” Soonyoung asked, looking around for Minghao.

“You and Wonwoo,” Jun tells him.

Forgetting about Minghao, Soonyoung turns his head to Jun, “What is being said?”

“You’re going out on a date with him, this Friday. You’re his date to Twenty 17.”

“Ahh,” Soonyoung said nodding, “That’s not a rumor. I am going to Twenty 17 with Wonwoo.”

“And you forgot to tell me? Your best friend?” Jun said, glaring.

“Oh come on, you were doing your homework last night and told me not to bother you,” Soonyoung pouted, “So I went on to do my own homework, which you didn’t even help me with. Plus, you would have found out from me today anyways. I was going to tell you and Minghao during our practice.”

“I’m surprise it wasn’t the first thing you shouted this morning when we met.”

“I wanted to,” Soonyoung grinned, “I wanted to show you all the texts we’ve sent to each other already. Do you want to see? I can show you while we wait.”

Jun leaned away, saying “No, it’s fine. But you don’t mind? Being the talk of the school at the moment?”

“Why would I care,” Soonyoung said, clinging onto Jun’s arm, smiling, “This is more than I ever expected.”

“You should care a little bit,” Jun said, not looking at Soonyoung anymore, “Minghao is walking over and he’s with Jihoon.”

Soonyoung stiffens at what he heard, looking around, “What are you talking about?”

“Over there,” Jun said, nodding to where two figures were walking towards them.

Looking at the direction Jun had mentioned, Soonyoung’s face paled, “They’ve been talking. Why is he looking at me like that?”

Jihoon was looking at Soonyoung, more like glaring at him. While Minghao still talked to the shorter of the two.

“I’m pretty sure, if the whole school has heard, Jihoon has also heard about you and Wonwoo. Did you really think he would be pleased?” Jun said.

“He should have realized this was going to happen sooner or later. I’ve told him many times over that I would never be his,” Soonyoung tells Jun, while still watching the two make their way over.

“Maybe seeing you and Wonwoo together will make him realize it,” Jun suggested.

“I hope so,” Soonyoung frowned.

They talked no more as Minghao and Jihoon walked into hearing distance. Minghao looked over and smiled to Jun. While Jihoon still stared at Soonyoung with a glare.

“Junnie,” Minghao greeted Jun, smiling as he takes his hand.

“Hi, Minghao,” Jun said back, “What were you guys talking about?”

Minghao smiled towards Jihoon before looking back at Jun, “We were talking about our song choices for the school’s talent show. I mentioned how we were going to be using one of Woozi’s original songs, and Jihoon-hyung wanted to know which one it was.”

Soonyoung frowned at this news, looking at Jihoon, “Why are you so interested in what music we’re dancing to?”

“You know why,” Jihoon tells him.

A sigh leaves Soonyoung, “Are you going to mention your obsession with me again? Because you should just give up. I’m sure you’ve heard all the talk already. I’m going out with Wonwoo now.”

He was getting tired of having Jihoon shadow him around. The guy had to give up sooner or later, and hopefully it was soon. Soonyoung wanted some alone time to be happy about Wonwoo. He didn’t want the constant reminder that he had a stalker.

Jun cleared his throat, catching the attention of the two boys glaring at each other, “Minghao and I are going to head out first. We’ll meet you at my place later, Soonyoung.”

Soonyoung looked towards Jun and nods, “I’ll be there soon.”

Making sure he had a good grip on Minghao’s hand, Jun leads him away. Trailing after Jun, Minghao leaves after giving Soonyoung and Jihoon a small wave of goodbye.

When Jun and Minghao were far enough, Soonyoung turns back to Jihoon, “You need to stop this. No matter what you’ve said in the past, you can’t change anything that has already happened. I’m going out with Wonwoo. Nothing will stop me from having a good time with him.”

Jihoon stood in front of him, listening on with a bored look. When Soonyoung was done, Jihoon sighed and said, “Nothing is going to change is true. You may be going out with Wonwoo, but in time you will see that he is not the one for you.”

“Why do you have to be this way?” Soonyoung said with growing annoyance.

“Why can’t you see that what you are doing is going to be pointless!” Jihoon growled back.

“I can’t do this anymore Jihoon. I cannot have you around me when I am trying to be happy with someone else. You have to understand that nothing is going to happen between you and me.”

Soonyoung was ready to storm away from Jihoon, he no longer wanted to have a repeating conversation. Turning to the side, he takes a step away from Jihoon. But his arms is taken a hold and he stops in step.

“I’m not done with you yet,” Jihoon said, pulling Soonyoung to the front of him again.

“Let go of me,” Soonyoung said, trying to get Jihoon off of his arm.

Not letting go, Jihoon steps in front of Soonyoung. And not stopping there, he keeps pushing till Soonyoung is up against the school’s wall.

“Stop this, Jihoon,” Soonyoung screams out.

“I will when I am done saying what I to say,” Jihoon said with a glare.

Glaring back, Soonyoung grits back, “What is it then?”

“You are mine,” Jihoon states as he tugs on Soonyoung’s tie, bring him down to Jihoon’s height. Not waiting to be pushed away, Jihoon pecks at Soonyoung’s lips.

Soonyoung pulls back, inhaling in shock of what just happened. His heart hammered in his chest. He couldn’t believe it happened again. Jihoon, the little creature that he is, kissed him again for the second time. 

Jihoon smirked and stepped back from the clearly irritated Soonyoung. Turning around to leave, he said to Soonyoung, “Go and practice. Try to forget me as you long for Friday to come around. I know you won’t be able to forget me soon. You have lips that will remember me.”

Clamping his eyes with anger, Soonyoung groans out in frustration. Falling to the floor, Soonyoung waits for Jihoon to disappear from his sight. He didn’t want to be bothered with having to run away from school, walking past the nightmare following him around. 

 

To Soonyoung’s surprise, Jihoon didn’t bother him Friday morning. Another surprise happened, Jihoon was found talking to Minghao and even Jun while he wasn’t around. When Soonyoung did come up to the group, the conversations would stop and Jihoon would say bye, leaving them without ever having acknowledging Soonyoung. 

When Soonyoung did ask his friends what it was all about, they didn’t have much to say other than that Jihoon had been asking them about music and art. Soonyoung wondered why he wasn’t ever invited to these conversations. Despite not wanting to be around Jihoon, he loved to converse about music and even art. In his mind, dancing was a form of art.

While Jihoon was out of the picture, Soonyoung was busy with talking to Wonwoo. He had gone to sleep blissfully after sharing a wonderful happy conversation with the boy he was going on a date with soon.

And now it was Friday and their date was going to happen that afternoon. All day long, Soonyoung was texting Wonwoo back and forth about their evening. Wonwoo was going to be performing that night, and if Wonwoo could work his magic, Soonyoung may even be talked into dancing a solo.

Everything about it sound perfect to Soonyoung. They were the pair of perfection. They both loved music, even if their spectrum of it was hip hop and dancing. Already, Soonyoung was hoping for a day when they could collaborate, Wonwoo would rap while Soonyoung would dance. 

It was a perfect day, where Soonyoung was glad he wasn’t bothered by a boy named Jihoon. He wasn’t going to ruin his day by remembering the boy who ruined his whole life in one day. He was going to look forward to the boy who made his life worth living in one day. Nothing at school could bother him, and nothing did.

As school was ending, and the cafe getting ready for the night, Soonyoung was going to spend an hour with Jun and Minghao before the trio headed to the cafe. Jun and Minghao had decided to go on their own date.

When it was time, the group leaves for the cafe.

“I cannot wait to see the show,” Minghao said, jumping around as he trailed behind Jun, “I’ve heard so many tales, and now we’re going to see it live.”

Jun looks back to the excited boy, “If you wanted to see this place so bad, you should have just mentioned it. I would have taken you.”

“I wasn’t sure if you guys wanted to take away time from practice for it,” Minghao said, still smiling.

“I would have talked to Soonyoung about it,” Jun said, smiling back, “And he would have came along too, I’m sure he likes watching people sing and dance too.”

Minghao nodded, “He does like to watch Woozi on Youtube a lot.”

Soonyoung had been keeping quiet, thinking about hanging out with Wonwoo, but now that they had mentioned him, he couldn’t stay silent, “I do not watch him a lot. I only watch him for inspiration.”

Jun and Minghao laugh together as they leave Soonyoung alone for the rest of the walk. As the trio enters the cafe, Soonyoung scans the crowd for the one person he was here to see. At a booth he finds Wonwoo surrounded by a his friends.

“Come on,” Soonyoung tells his friends, as he leads them over to Wonwoo. Thankfully the booth next over was empty, and they decided to claim it for the night. 

After seeing Jun and Minghao comfortably seated and deep in conversation, Soonyoung decided it was time to make himself known to Wonwoo. Stepping over to stand in front of their booth, Soonyoung waves to the group of people.

“Hi,” Soonyoung waved.

Wonwoo stands up, smiling, “I was wondering when you were going to show up.”

“Who's this?” one of Wonwoo’s friend said, looking Soonyoung up and down.

“Squeeze over,” Wonwoo said, pushing on his friend next to him, “Let him sit down.”

Everyone moves over and Soonyoung sits down next to Wonwoo. Finally being this close to his crush was sending Soonyoung over the moon. He had only dreamt of a chance like this, and it was happening. He wanted to hold Wonwoo’s hand, but wondered if it was too soon. Even though he was having those thoughts, Wonwoo took his hand anyway and held it up on the table.

“Everyone, this is my date Soonyoung,” Wonwoo tells his friends. “He asked me out, and I agreed. We’ve been chatting together for awhile.”

“Our Wonwoo is dating?” another friend of Wonwoo’s asked.

“I’m Seokmin by the way. Since Wonwoo doesn’t know how to introduce his friends,” the boy across Soonyoung said.

Wonwoo chuckled, “Sorry, I was too excited to tell you guys about Soonyoung.” As Wonwoo gestured to each of the boys, he said their names, “Seokmin, as you know, Hansol, Seungkwan, and Mingyu.”

Seungkwan and Hansol waved, and said, “Hello.”

While all Soonyoung got from Mingyu was a simple, “Hey.”

“Hi,” Soonyoung greeted them again, smiling.

“We’re going to be going up soon to perform,” Wonwoo tells Soonyoung, “Are you going to be okay by yourself?”

Soonyoung shakes his head slightly, “I’ll go over to sit by my friends. Did you want to meet them?”

With a gentle smile, Wonwoo nods, “Sure.”

Soonyoung stands up and leaves the booth, waiting for Wonwoo. When both boys were up, Soonyoung leds them to the next booth over.

“You’re just right next to us,” Wonwoo said chuckling.

“Yup. When I saw it empty, I decided to take it,” Soonyoung said with a grin.

And even when he saw that Jun and Minghao had more people at their table, it didn’t stop the grin on his lips.

“Jihoon, what a surprise,” Soonyoung said.

Jun looks over to Soonyoung, saying, “We had the room, so they joined us. I hope it’s okay.”

“It’s fine,” Soonyoung tells him, “I just wanted to introduce you guys to Wonwoo.”

They all smile and wave to Wonwoo, who was observing not only the table in front of him but his own table of friends as well. 

“Wonwoo, these are my friends, and some people here I don’t know. Jun and Minghao. Then there is Jihoon, and I'm guessing his friends.”

“You’re right,” one of Jihoon’s friend spoke up, “We are Jihoon’s friends. I’m Seungcheol, next to me is Jisoo, Jeonghan, and Jeonghan’s kid brother, Dino, who is going to be entering next year. He wanted to see the cafe.”

“Nice to meet you Soonyoung,” Jisoo spoke up, a smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eyes, “I’ve been wanting to meet you for a while now.”

Soonyoung didn’t know whether to smile or frown at his words. Jisoo seemed nice enough, but he was also Jihoon’s friend, and he wasn’t too sure if he should trust anyone who was friends with Jihoon.

“Are you going to be okay here?” Wonwoo asked, gaining Soonyoung’s attention.

Turning to Wonwoo, Soonyoung smiled, “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I can’t wait to see you on stage.”

 

“So Soonyoung, tell us, why is our aggressive tiny talented friend so infatuated with you?” Jeonghan said, leaning over the table with his chin in his palms.

“I’m not tiny,” Jihoon said with boredom.

Seungcheol nodded, “Yeah, Jihoon is our cute petite friend.”

“I’m not cute,” Jihoon said with a scowl.

Chan leaned over to Jun and Minghao and asked them, “Do you guys dance like Soonyoung too?”

Jun and Minghao looked curiously over at the young boy and nodded.

“Cool,” Chan said, smiling, “I overheard Jihoon mentioning Soonyoung’s hobby of dancing, and got super excited since I like dancing as well. It’s nice to meet more people who love dancing.”

Jisoo glared towards Soonyoung, “You never answered, Soonyoung. Why is it that Jihoon likes you so much.”

Soonyoung blinked in confusion. What was he supposed to tell these people who he barely knew, he didn’t know the reason for Jihoon’s crazy crush on him as well. 

“Leave him alone,” Jihoon said, speaking up.

“Yeah, it doesn’t even matter,” Seungcheol said, smiling to Jihoon, “We all know that one of these days, you’re finally going to say yes to me asking you out.”

The whole table went quiet as Chan sighed, looking at Seungcheol in disbelief. Jeonghan tsked and Jisoo shook his head. Jun and Minghao watched Soonyoung, wondering how their friend was taking in this new information.

A indescribable pain was building in Soonyoung’s chest. His heartbeat pulsed with an unfamiliar ache. What did Seungcheol mean with his words? And more importantly, why did it bother Soonyoung so much?


	5. Your Secret Admirer 5

Soonyoung sat in awe as he watched his long time crush perform in front of him. How did he not think of this before. Watching Wonwoo and his friends perform made hairs grow all along his arms, and butterflies flittered through his stomach. Everything about the performance was beautiful.

If he wasn’t expecting another few hours of talking with Wonwoo, Soonyoung wanted to run home so he could start planning a new choreography. He was inspired.

After Wonwoo was done performing, Soonyoung went to the empty booth to wait for him. Even though he was worried with how he was feeling about Jihoon, he had been waiting for this night too long. He wasn’t going to let anything ruin his time with Wonwoo.

“Hey,” Wonwoo said, walking over to Soonyoung to sit down next to him, “How did you like it?”

“I loved it,” Soonyoung smiled so wide his cheeks hurt, “You were amazing. How did I not know our school hid such a talented person?”

Wonwoo smiled, “Thanks Soonyoung. I’m not that great though, I still have a lot to learn.”

“If you get any better you’re going to have fans following you everywhere,” Soonyoung joked.

“He already does,” Mingyu said, sliding into the booth next to Wonwoo.

Soonyoung’s eyes widened, turning to Wonwoo, “You have fans?”

“Just some girls and guys who come to watch whenever we perform. I’m surprised you didn’t notice them. They were pretty loud.”

Then it came to Soonyoung, “The screaming crowd in front of the stage? They are your fans?”

Seungkwan, who entered the booth with Seokmin, said, “They are OUR fans.”

Seokmin chuckles, saying, “Wonwoo is great, but only a handful are his personal fans.”

Mingyu leans in, looking around the room, “Where is Hansol?”

Getting up, Seungkwan sighs, “Must have gotten lost again. No matter how many times we come here, he just doesn’t pay attention. I’ll go find him.”

Once Seungkwan leaves the table, Seokmin turns to Soonyoung, “Wonwoo tells us you dance as a hobby.”

“I do,” Soonyoung flushed, thinking about how Wonwoo was telling his friends about him.

“He’s going to be performing at the talent show,” Wonwoo tells his friends.

Seokmin nodded while grinning, “I’m sure Wonwoo told you, this place is an open stage. Not many people turn up to perform. I’m sure if you wanted to, you could get a slot later.”

Rubbing the back of his neck, Soonyoung frowned, “I don’t know. I haven’t performed in a long time.”

“Think of it as a practice for when you do perform for the talent show,” Seokmin continued, “I’m sure your friends at the other table would enjoy it too.”

“Yeah,” Wonwoo chimed in, “Come on. We have been talking about it. I would love to see you dancing, I haven’t seen it before.”

Despite the semi dimmed room, Soonyoung was sure they could all see the redness rush to his cheeks. And he couldn’t help it, right now Wonwoo was his weakness. He knew he was going to be dancing tonight, and he was prepared.

Nodding, Soonyoung smiled and said, “Okay. For you Wonwoo, I’ll dance.”

Wonwoo smiles at him.

 

After his performance, Soonyoung walks over to Wonwoo’s booth with a huge smile on his face, feeling very accomplished for the night. The crowd was nice to him, his friends and acquaintances hyped him up. It was a good performance, and it only made Soonyoung want to be on stage even more.

Wonwoo was clapping as he watched Soonyoung make his way to the booth and sit down. “You should teach me some moves.”

Soonyoung chuckles, “You want to learn some dancing? Only if you teach me how to rap.”

Taking Soonyoung’s hand, Wonwoo nods, “Most definitely.”

Hearing a huge sigh from across the table, Soonyoung turns to face Mingyu.

Mingyu looks to Wonwoo and said, “I think I’m going to be going home for the night. I’m sure Seungkwan and Hansol went home already, seeing as they never came back.”

Next to Mingyu, Seokmin nods, “I’m probably going to head out as well. It was good meeting you Soonyoung.”

Wonwoo nods, “Okay, see you guys tomorrow.”

“Have a good night,” Seokmin said, waving, leading himself and Mingyu out of the booth.

“Bye,” Soonyoung waved to Wonwoo’s friends.

Once his friends were gone, Wonwoo turns to Soonyoung, “Did you want us to go join your friends in their booth?”

“If you’re okay with it,” Soonyoung nodded, hoping it would be.

“I would like to get to know them more too,” Wonwoo said.

Without looking away from the face of his crush, Soonyoung gets up to lead Wonwoo to the booth next to them. Holding onto his hands, Soonyoung doesn’t let go till they were comfortably seated next to Jun and Minghao. Jihoon and his friends still sits across from them.

“Is it normal for your friends to be leaving so early into the night?” Jun asked Wonwoo as they settled into their seats.

Shrugging, Wonwoo said, “I’m not sure what was up with them tonight. It’s fine though. You guys get me then.”

“Great,” Jihoon said dully.

“Attitude, Jihoon,” Jisoo scolded.

“It’s nice to have you guys join us,” Jeonghan said smiling.

Chan nods with excitement, a huge smile on his face, “I’ve been getting to know Jun-hyung and Minghao-hyung. If Jeonghan-hyung is willing to send me, I want to go see you guys practicing. Jun-hyung said it would be okay with you, Soonyoung-hyung.”

Chuckling at the young boy’s excitement, Soonyoung agrees, “Of course it’s fine.”

Gasping, Chan turns to Jeonghan, “Hyung, you have to send me to one of their practices now.”

“Okay,” Jeonghan said, smiling to his kid brother.

“You did pretty good up there,” Minghao said to Soonyoung, “When did you get time to practice that choreography?”

“Someone inspired me,” Soonyoung said smiling.

“You’re going to have to teach it to us on our spare time,” Minghao goes on, “After I get the moves down for the talent show of course.”

“I’m sure we’ll have time for it,” Jun said, bobbing his head along to the music in the background, “You’re following along just fine, Minghao.”

“So,” Seungcheol leaned in on the table, “Soonyoung. I hear you are going out with Wonwoo now.”

Soonyoung’s lips figeted, almost losing his smile, “We’re on our first date.”

Wonwoo also leaned in, staring at Seungcheol, “Why are you so interested in a relationship that doesn’t involve you?”

“Just making sure there won’t be any issues in the future,” Seungcheol smirked.

Jihoon sighed, rolling his eyes, “What kind of issues would you be thinking of?”

Seungcheol turned his attention to Jihoon, leaning towards him, “Making sure our future isn’t bothered, of course.”

Wonwoo had a tight smile on, asking, “Why would both your future be bothered if Soonyoung and I weren’t together?”

“Ahh,” Jeonghan clapped his hands together, “You don’t know, do you, Wonwoo?”

“What don’t I know?” Wonwoo asked, clearly agitated.

“Nothing,” Soonyoung intercepted, “Wonwoo, don’t listen to them. Who cares what they have to say. How about you walk me home now. It’s getting pretty late already.”

“If you guys are leaving, Minghao and I are going to be leaving too,” Jun said, “It’s been fun, but it is getting late.”

“Awww,” Chan pouted, “already? We should do this again.”

Minghao smiled to the young boy, “Of course.”

Wonwoo sighed, “Yeah, Soonyoung. We should leave for the night. I’ll walk you home.” Facing the others, Wonwoo tells them, “It was great meeting you guys. Have a good night.”

“Text me later,” Soonyoung tells Jun, getting up from the booth. Without another goodbye, he follows Wonwoo out of Twenty17.

Once they were away from the rest of the crowd, and on the dimly lit streets, Soonyoung inhaled some fresh air. He had a smile on his face, glad to be alone with Wonwoo again. 

“Sorry about those guys back there. It was my first time meeting them too. So I’m honestly not sure myself what they were saying,” Soonyoung tells Wonwoo.

Wonwoo shrugs, “I’m not going to worry too much about it.”

“Tonight was amazing by the way,” Soonyoung smiled towards Wonwoo.

“You were pretty great on the stage,” Wonwoo smiled, finally.

Soonyoung smiled wider, running a hand through his hair, “It’s just something I do. What you were doing though, that was amazing.”

“I know,” Wonwoo smirked, “I am pretty amazing.”

With a chuckle, Soonyoung playfully pushed Wonwoo.

“Seriously though,” Wonwoo continued, “Tonight was nice. I’m glad you got to meet my friends. And your friends seemed nice too, the ones you actually knew of.”

“Jun and Minghao are great, they’ve always got my back.”

Looking around at the scenery, Soonyoung frowned, they had reached his house. Stopping in front of the house, Soonyoung lingered, not saying anything. He didn’t want his moment alone with Wonwoo to end just yet.

“This is you?” Wonwoo asked.

Nodding, Soonyoung said, “This is me.”

“I’m glad you had a good night, Soonyoung. I’ll see you on Monday, yeah?”

“Of course,” Soonyoung said, not taking his eyes off of Wonwoo, “Are you going to be okay, walking alone?”

Wonwoo smiles, nodding, “I’ll be okay. Go on in.”

Soonyoung leaves with never ending happiness in his heart. He just had a very good first date with his crush, Wonwoo.

 

The rest of the weekend goes.... uneventful. Soonyoung tries to message Wonwoo throughout the two days, and he does respond but his texts comes minutes, even hours, after. 

“Do you think I did something wrong?” Soonyoung asked Jun, “I mean, I thought everything was fine. We ended the night well enough.”

Jun turns around in his computer, facing Soonyoung, “I haven’t been on many dates, but maybe this kind of stuff happens. The first date can go well, and everything kind of sours after.”

Laying on Jun’s bed, Soonyoung pouts, “If that is true, then this sucks. I really thought he liked me.”

“He’s a fool to not like you,” Jun consoles his friend, “You guys would have been a cute couple.”

“We would have been an amazing couple,” Soonyoung tells him.

“Everyone would have been jealous,” Jun continues.

“Everyone!” Soonyoung repeats.

The two goes quiets as they think about their conversation. The smiles falling off their face.

With a sigh, Soonyoung wonders out loud, “Then why aren’t we planning a second date right now?”

 

Monday comes, and Soonyoung is nervous. Nothing he and Wonwoo had been texting each other were getting them anywhere. Soonyoung was expecting a lot of their next meeting, but it scared him. What if his fear was right and Wonwoo wanted nothing with Soonyoung now.

Soonyoung was picking at his food, listening to Jun and Minghao whisper to each other. Lunch had barely begun, and he had already lost his appetite. Wonwoo had yet to message him something worth reading.

“Soonyoung!”

Turning his head towards the voice, Soonyoung grimaces at the sight of Jihoon walking over. He had forgotten all about Jihoon as he was occupied with thoughts of Wonwoo.

“What is going on?” Jun asked.

“I don’t know,” Soonyoung whispered back.

Reaching their table now, Jihoon slams his hands in front of Soonyoung, “I need you to come with me NOW!”

“Wha-?” Soonyoung barely got out as Jihoon grabbed his wrist.

All Soonyoung could hear was Jun sighing and Minghao yelling “See you later Hyung” as he was pulled out of the cafeteria.

“Jihoon,” Soonyoung gritted out, “What are you doing, and where are you taking me?”

Not stopping anytime soon, Jihoon spitted back, “Be quiet, Kwon Soonyoung. Just follow me.”

“Do you think I am a fool? Who are you to think I would follow you so blindly?” Soonyoung questioned.

“Stop talking,” Jihoon tells him as he leads them through their school’s hallways. 

Soonyoung huffs but follows, knowing it was pointless against Jihoon.

A good distance from the cafeteria, Jihoon comes to a stop.

“What?” Soonyoung said, stopping before he collided into Jihoon.

Without telling Soonyoung, Jihoon points at the window into the classroom they were by. Soonyoung frowns but complies, looking into the classroom. He couldn’t help but be curious as to what Jihoon had wanted to show him.

His heart dropped at the sight in the room. Wonwoo had Mingyu pushed against the chalkboard, lips locked, in the middle of a heated kiss. 

Turning around, he tried to calm his fast beating heart. Soonyoung didn’t want to look anymore. HAe had seen enough. Tears were already threatening to fall. Why did he have to witness this?

Not having enough energy to pull away, Soonyoung stood there in shock as Jihoon leaned up to his ear.

“And this is why you are never going to be with Wonwoo,” Jihoon whispered.


	6. Your Secret Admirer 6

Soonyoung did something he’s never done before. After seeing the scene he just did, after having to hear Jihoon’s words, Soonyoung bolted for the doors and never went back to school for the day. Who cares about classes, he was already doing okay in all of them, school was nearing summer vacation.

Knowing he couldn’t go home, to face his mom, Soonyoung went to the neighborhood playground. There wouldn’t be too many people around on a early afternoon. 

Climbing one of the small towers, Soonyoung laid on the very top level, curling up into a ball. He didn’t want to have to deal with everything going on around him. It was a safe enough neighborhood for Soonyoung to take a small nap and run away to another land for a while. Closing his eyes against the shining sun, Soonyoung pushed all his troubles away.

 

“Kwon Soonyoung!”

A voice jolted Soonyoung awake. Opening up his eyes, he looked around at his surrounding in confusion. Why was he sleeping out in the open and not in his bed? Slowly moving into a sitting position, Soonyoung wiped his eyes clear.

“What’s going on?” he asked himself. His elbows were propped up by his knee and his head was held by his hands. 

A sigh comes from behind him, “I would like to know that myself too.”

Bringing his head up, Soonyoung turns to see who had joined him.

Jun was sitting behind him, cross-legged, watching Soonyoung, shaking his head. “You don’t even think to text me where you are or if you’re alive or not?”

“Jun? What time is it?” Soonyoung frowned.

“School let out for the day. When I couldn’t find you I had Minghao help me try to find you, and by the way I did text him to go home already. See how I care about my friends? I don’t leave them wondering about my well-being,” Jun ranted to Soonyoung.

Covering his face, Soonyoung groaned at how upset Jun was. He’s never seen his friend like this. What made it worse was that Jun was right, if he wasn’t so stuck in his own issues, he would have, and should have, texted Jun. 

“I’m sorry,” Soonyoung got out.

“Never mind that,” Jun said, scooting closer to Soonyoung now, “What happened to you to make all of this happened? You never skip out on school half way through.”

“Auugh,” Soonyoung grogged out at the memory, “Jihoon wanted to show me something.”

“Should we tell the teachers about him?” Jun cut in, “I mean, I’ve been thinking about it recently. He’s a pain to deal with, and at least if the teachers know, Jihoon won’t be so prone to bothering you anymore.”

Shaking his head, Soonyoung sighed, “It wasn’t just because of Jihoon, and anyways I’m sure teachers wouldn’t be able to stop him. He’s too determined to do whatever he wants. Jihoon showed me what Wonwoo had been busy with. I know why he hasn’t been texting me back.”

Jun leaned in and looked on with curiosity, “Well, don’t keep me waiting. Tell me what he’s been busy with. I want to know what’s going on.”

“Wonwoo was kissing Mingyu. They were alone in an unused classroom. Wonwoo had Mingyu against the chalkboard. They were kissing.”

Seeing how red in the face Soonyoung was, Jun reached out to comfort his friend. And now that Soonyoung was alone with his friend, he let out the tears he had been trying to keep in. As tears trickled down Soonyoung’s cheeks, he tried to keep his hiccups down. Letting the pain wash over him, Soonyoung tried his hardest to get over his one year crush.

“Are you sure?” Jun asked.

“Just think about it Jun,” Soonyoung said, “He wanted just the one date. He barely contacted me after, I was the one always texting him first. I could already tell where it was heading. I just didn’t know Mingyu was involved. And it was Wonwoo who was leading that kiss, he had Mingyu in his hold.”

“He’s such a jerk,” Jun said with a scowl.

“Why did I have to end up liking someone like him?” Soonyoung cried out.

“That’s it,” Jun shouted, “I don’t care if it is a Monday. We’re going to call Minghao up and we’re going to go drinking. We’re not going home till you’re drunk and done screaming at Wonwoo and Mingyu.”

Soonyoung didn’t have the energy to stop Jun. So they called Minghao, got off the tower, and went to drink their problems away. True to Jun’s words, only after Soonyoung was done screaming out his pain in drunken agony did Jun and Minghao take him home. 

 

“I hate you,” Soonyoung groaned to his best friend. It was Tuesday, and Soonyoung was nursing a hangover and a headache. Everything hurt too much for him to stomach anything. He was sitting at lunch with Jun and Minghao, trying to drink some water.

“At least have some of your food, Hyung,” Minghao said to him, “Your hangover isn’t going to get any better if you don’t.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Soonyoung snapped.

Jun sighed, “Stop acting like a child. Also, say sorry.”

“Sorry, Minghao. I didn’t mean it. I’m just not in a good mood right now.”

Shaking his head, Minghao smiled, “It’s okay Hyung, I understand.”

“What are your plans now, now that you basically have to give up on Wonwoo,” Jun asked.

Soonyoung glanced around the room and didn’t see anyone to worry about, “Avoid people like crazy. Finish this school year with the talent show. Work hard during the summer. And avoid people like crazy again next year.”

“That sounds great and all,” Jun started, “but we all know that’s only false hope. You have someone who follows you around. You have us, your friends, who want the best for you.”

Tilting his head, Soonyoung pouted, “If you guys want the best for me, help me get rid of Jihoon.”

Taking a moment to think, Soonyoung gasped as he had come up with an idea, “I know. Let’s pretend I’m going out with you, Jun. Once he sees how deep our connection is he’ll have no choice but to leave.”

Jun rolled his eyes, “That’s not an option. You had Wonwoo in your life, and Jihoon was still around. Plus, I can’t pretend to be your boyfriend when I already have someone I like.”

“But Jihoon backed off for a while when he found out about Wonwoo,” Soonyoung whined.

“That’s not what I know of,” Minghao interjected.

“What did you know?” Jun asked, blinking in curiousity.

“Just the usual thing Jihoon always tells us,” Minghao shrugs, “One of these days Soonyoung would see how perfect they would be for each other. And also how Wonwoo probably doesn’t even like Soonyoung the way Jihoon does. It’s all he ever talks about when we’re not talking about music, art, or dancing.”

“He has it pretty bad,” Jun said, shaking his head.

Soonyoung couldn’t help but wonder why Jihoon even thought about him, especially when he had someone like Seungcheol around him. It was pretty evident Seungcheol thought the world of Jihoon.

 

A few days had passed and Soonyoung was doing a pretty good job of avoiding Wonwoo. He was pretty easy to ignore. Not responding to any surprising texts, running the other way when he saw Wonwoo in hallways, finishing his lunch as soon as possible to go hide in the library or in his next class. 

It was Jihoon Soonyoung had troubles avoiding. No matter where he went, Jihoon had some way of finding him. And Jihoon didn’t even want to talk to him most of the time, he was content to just sit near Soonyoung. Which still annoyed Soonyoung to no end, but at least he didn’t have to waste time and effort to tell the boy to not bother him.

It was Friday, and Soonyoung was leaving the school’s ground with Jun and Minghao. They were leaving with the intent to practice for the upcoming talent show.

The group didn’t make it far when Soonyoung heard his name being call. 

“Soonyoung!”

Soonyoung recognized the voice and closed his eyes with a grimace. He didn’t want to have to deal with this right now. He’s been doing so well at avoiding it, he didn’t want to think of eventually having to talk to him.

“Soonyoung, please don’t run away,” Wonwoo called out, his voice getting closer.

Opening his eyes, Soonyoung turns to his friends, unsure of what to do.

“I’m not going anywhere, Soonyoung, no matter what you say,” Jun tells him.

Minghao nods along, “I’m staying too.”

“Thanks,” Soonyoung whispers as he prepares himself to face Wonwoo.

Turning around, Soonyoung sees Wonwoo walking towards them. 

“Hey,” Wonwoo said as he got closer, “It’s been awhile since we’ve talked. I’ve been trying to text you too. What’s going on?”

“You tell me, Wonwoo,” Soonyoung calmly asked, “Why did you want to go out with me in the first place?”

Wonwoo smiled, trying to lighten up the mood, “You asked, so of course I said yes. You seemed like a nice guy to get to know.”

“So you had no motivations behind it?” Soonyoung continued to ask, wanting to hear it from Wonwoo.

“What motivations? Come on, Soonyoung, I would never go out with someone with evil intent.”

“I saw you with Mingyu though,” Soonyoung finally sputtered out.

“Mingyu? He’s my friend, of course I’m around him,” Wonwoo said as his smile faltered.

Soonyoung shook his head, “Friends don’t kiss each other the way I saw you guys kissing on Monday.”

Now Wonwoo wasn’t smiling anymore. He paled at Soonyoung’s words. “Soonyoung. I can explain. You weren’t supposed to hear about it this way.”

“I wasn’t supposed to know? So you were just going to two time us. Only, I’m sure Mingyu is in on it too, considering he knew we were on a date last Friday.”

“You have to understand,” Wonwoo pleaded, “I’ve been in love with Mingyu for such a long time, and he wouldn’t even look my way till you showed up.”

“Were you at all serious about me then? You can’t just ignore all those feelings and turn to someone new,” Soonyoung questioned.

Wonwoo sighed, “I wanted to be serious. I really did. I thought it was time to give up, especially since Mingyu wasn’t giving me the time of day. Bu-but the relationship you and I had sparked something in him. He’s finally opened up to the idea of him and I being together. I couldn’t give that up.”

“I hate you,” Soonyoung said calmly, “I had a crush on you for a year, I wasted a year liking you, I lost precious time thinking about you for over a year. And I hate you even more for breaking my heart. So go and be with Mingyu, but don’t ever do something that low ever again.”

“I’m sorry, Soonyoung,” Wonwoo said dejectedly, “I don’t know what I can do to ever make you forgive me. I never wanted this to happen.”

“Just leave us alone,” Soonyoung said, turning to leave. 

 

To stop thinking about Wonwoo, Soonyoung immersed himself in dancing and music. When he wasn’t dancing, he was listening to music. And by music, it meant Woozi.

Soonyoung was laying in bed, once again going through Woozi’s videos, enjoying the voice of the singer. It had been a while since he let himself watch all of Woozi’s videos, and after dealing with a week like he did, he needed the comfort of Woozi’s voice. 

Accidently hitting Youtube’s home button, Soonyoung sees a new video from Woozi. His heartbeat fastens with excitement. This is exactly what he’s been needing. A new video from his favorite youtuber.

Clicking on the video, Soonyoung sits in anticipation of what he was going to hear. The first thing he noticed was the clean white mask Woozi wore. Nothing was painted on it this time around.

As with every new video Woozi put out, Soonyoung watched with awe. He could only hope to someday make this this much contribution to the world of music and arts. 

While he laid there in his bedroom, Soonyoung listened to the sadness in Woozi’s voice. He didn’t even notice it, but tears found their way from Soonyoung’s eyes and flowed to the side of his face. 

Everything Woozi was singing about, if only happiness was simple.

 


	7. Your Secret Admirer 7

The talent show was coming up pretty quick now. Soonyoung was in it, of course for the dancing, but also for the winning prize. He didn’t want to bother his parents for money or gifts, and his parents wanted him to concentrate on school work instead of getting a job. So he needed this. His goal was to start up his own youtube account to get his work and the talents of his group out there. He also secretly hoped he would catch the attention of Woozi, since they would be using his songs, but he didn’t want to dream that high yet.

As the days counted down to it, Soonyoung pushed himself pretty hard. 

“Soonyoung,” Jun said as he stopped the music Soonyoung was dancing to, “I know how important this is you, but losing sleep, and spending all your time cramped up in here isn’t going to help you.”

Reaching out for his phone, Soonyoung said, “You don’t understand Jun.”

Standing his ground, Jun moves the phone away from Soonyoung’s grabbing hands, “I do. You’re still pretty upset about what happened. I get it, I do. But this isn’t healthy. You need sleep, you need to eat something more than a mouthful. Dancers need to be physically and mentally healthy, you need both right now more than ever.”

“I need this to be perfect though Jun,” Soonyoung pleaded.

“And it already is perfect. Your choreography is something I’ve never seen anywhere. Your ideas are overflowing with creativity. The judges would have to be blind to not see the talent. What you’re misplacing the need of perfection with is the need to ignore reality.”

“Can we not talk about this?” Soonyoung’s voice growing weaker.

Jun shook his head, “Just when will we talk about it then? You’ve been avoiding the topic like the plague. You need to get your emotions out before you explode.”

Soonyoung was tired of all these accusations. Jun didn’t understand that all Soonyoung wanted and needed was to be left alone and to never talk about Wonwoo again. The anger boiled in him as he continued to listen his friend. He didn’t need all of this from Jun.

Yelling out, Soonyoung said, “I have gotten my emotions out, you guys took me out drinking, I was confronted by Wonwoo himself, and you have no idea how much I cried each and every night. I am over all of it already.”

“Then why do you look like you are suffering?”

“Because, news flash, life sucks. Thanks for tell me I look like shit.” Soonyoung walked away from Jun. Even if his friend wasn’t going let him listen to music, he could still dance.

There was a strain in their friendship. Soonyoung wanted to make it better, but he stuck with his beliefs. If he didn’t, he would really have to face his realities.

He couldn’t live without dancing and music at the moment. The only thing to numb the pain was dancing, and listening to music helped heal the pain. 

Then there was sleep, and sleep came with nightmares. He stayed up for as long as he could so he wouldn’t have to go through that every night. Soonyoung did know what he was doing to himself, but it was within reason. How else was he supposed to reach his goals if he didn’t make little sacrifices every now and then.

To avoid the awkwardness, Soonyoung was going to forgo lunch and spend the time in his next class watching Woozi’s videos. He was feeling fine, he had bought some snacks earlier and had eaten it during breaks in between class. Walking down the hallway, Soonyoung didn’t even realize he was being followed till someone grabbed his hand.

A small hand intertwined themselves in his and made him stop in the middle of the hallway. The movement shocked Soonyoung, and he forgot all about pulling away. Turning around to face the intruder, Soonyoung half expected who it would be.

“Jihoon,” Soonyoung said with a sigh.

“You’re going to eat today,” Jihoon said, already pulling him towards the cafeteria. 

“You can eat, I’m not hungry,” Soonyoung pouted, knowing he had no choice but to follow Jihoon.

“We’re both eating,” Jihoon tells him, as he kept a tight hold on Soonyoung.

Soonyoung was trying his best to keep them at a far distance, dragging Jihoon down a bit. He was going to go, but he didn’t have to be willing. “I’m not eating.”

Jihoon scoffs, “Stop being a child. Or if you want, I can feed you like a child.”

“Don’t you dare,” Soonyoung scowled.

“If you behaved your age, I wouldn’t have to be doing this right now,” Jihoon scolded.

“I don’t know why you’re getting yourself involved. This doesn’t involve you,” Soonyoung said back.

Jihoon shook his head in disbelief, “If you bothered to notice things around you, you would have noticed that it does involve me. It’s involved me for some time now, idiot.”

Soonyoung didn’t get the chance to rebuke, they had entered the cafeteria and Jihoon was dragging him towards the line for food. Trying to ignore everyone around them, Soonyoung crouched away from the crowd. Moving away from prying eyes only made Soonyoung move closer to Jihoon, and when he realized this he took careful steps away from him too. Nothing was working in his favor.

“Stop dawdling around, grab yourself a plate of food,” Jihoon demanded of Soonyoung.

Wanting to disappear, Soonyoung groaned, kicking air.

Jihoon stops what he is doing and stares at him, “Jun did mention how childish you can be, but this is a bit much.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but glare, “You’ve been talking to Jun about me?”

“What else do we have to talk about, other than you?” Jihoon replied.

“I’m not childish. You all are, for forcing me to eat when I don’t want to,” Soonyoung accused.

“Fine,” Jihoon said, turning around to pay attention to his food, “I guess we can share a plate. I’m just going to have to feed you.”

“Why are you doing this?” Soonyoung asked quietly, not expecting a real answer.

Jihoon was about to grab another scoop full of rice when he stopped. Turning around again, he looked at Soonyoung in the eyes and said, “I could ask you the same thing. Why are you torturing yourself over someone who doesn’t give a shit about you?”

Soonyoung looked away from Jihoon’s piercing glare. He didn’t want to respond to that question. It hurt too much to even think about why all of this happened in the first pace.

Grabbing his own plate, Soonyoung quietly spooned himself food. Jihoon didn’t leave his side through it all, making sure Soonyoung grabbed a bit of everything. When Jihoon was satisfied with how much Soonyoung had on his plate, he moved over to the table occupied by two very familiar people.

Jihoon sets his plate down in front of Minghao, and Soonyoung stands awkwardly in front Jun. He was unsure if he should even sit down, what if Jun didn’t want to talk to him right now. 

All Soonyoung wanted to do was apologize, and give in to Jun’s expectations. He wanted his best friend back, with anything it would take to make it happen. 

“Are you going to sit down?” Jun said without looking up.

“Sit down, Hyung,” Minghao said, looking up at him with a small smile.

Giving Minghao a small thankful smile, Soonyoung placed his plate down and sat in front of Jun. He sat there unmoving, not knowing what to do in this kind of situation. Soonyoung has been in tiny arguments with Jun before, and they made up quickly, but this was something different.

“Eat, Kwon Soonyoung,” Jihoon said to him, “Otherwise I will keep my promise.”

Sighing, Soonyoung picked up his spoon. Still not having any food near his mouth, he poked at his food a bit. He had to prepare himself for the food.

Minghao leaned over to Jihoon, and in a loud whisper, he asked, “What promise did you make, Hyung?”

With a grin, Jihoon leaned over and said back, “If he didn’t feed himself, I would.”

“Ahh,” Minghao exclaimed, while nodding, “That’s a good one. Jun has been thinking of ways to make him eat. I wanted to tie him down and force him to eat, but Jun said it wouldn’t work. If you have any ideas to make him sleep too, it would be cool. He hasn’t been sleeping. He just keeps dancing.”

“Are you guys done talking about me now?” Soonyoung asked, glaring at the two.

“Eat,” Jihoon said, pointing to Soonyoung’s plate.

Rolling his eyes, Soonyoung brought a spoon of food to his mouth and ate it. Through a mouth full, he asked, “Are you guys happy now? Is it so great to see me eating?”

“Chew your food first, Hyung,” Minghao said in disgust, “That’s just gross.”

Jun looked up from his food and said, “You better swallow your food, or I am going to take up Minghao’s suggestion and tie you up.”

Taking his time to chew and swallow, Soonyoung tells them, “You know, for friends, you guys are too much.”

“We’re too much?” Jun replies, “We’re the ones trying to keep you alive. We’re the ones who are still here, even after everything that has happened. Even when you’ve been treating everyone like crap, we’re still here.”

There was nothing to say after that. Soonyoung knew it was true. His friends were still around, trying to take care of him. As much as he wanted to discredit Jihoon too, he couldn’t. 

Seeing how hard his friends were working to make Soonyoung have a normal schedule again, he did want to revert back to his old ways. He wanted to not be so caught up in the heartache of losing a crush. But he didn’t know how to go back to being happy again. When he was happy, he had a crush, and now he wouldn’t have that anymore.

The table goes quiet, and Soonyoung eats as quickly as he could, he wanted to leave as soon as possible.

“Slow down,” Jihoon said, bringing his arm in front of Soonyoung’s chest. “You’re not going to get to run away that easily, and you’re going to make yourself throw up if you continue at that pace.”

Sighing, Soonyoung puts down his spoon to take his time chewing. 

Jihoon slides a cup of water over to his view, “Drink some water.”

Without being fussy about it, Soonyoung takes the water. 

After Jihoon finishes his plate, he waits for Soonyoung. After Soonyoung is done, they both stand up to leave.

Jihoon tells Jun and Minghao, “I’m gonna walk Soonyoung to his class. I’ll talk to you guys later.”

Minghao looks up to Jihoon and smiles, “Okay Hyung. See you later. Bye Soonyoung-hyung, I’ll see you later too.”

Soonyoung nodded, “See you later.”

When they are back in the hallways, Jihoon leads Soonyoung to his next class. Soonyoung slowly follows, knowing they had time left. He was very confuse, nothing in the moment made sense. All he wanted was to be friends with Jun and Minghao again, and he was their friends but it wasn’t the same. He also wanted to have never met someone like Jihoon, but at the same time he was honestly thankful of the ever prying demon who actually looked out for him.

“Everyone knows you want to, so why don’t you just apologize to them, and move on,” Jihoon said without looking back at him.

Pouting, Soonyoung replied, “Everything isn’t that simple.”

Stopping in his track to look at Soonyoung, Jihoon said, “It can be that simple.”

 

Later that day, Soonyoung was in his bedroom working on homework. He wanted to forget it all since the school year was coming to a close, but he knew his parents would be disappointed if he gave up. So he continued on.

He had his earphones on, listening to a playlist he had made of Woozi’s videos. Mumbling along, Soonyoung tried to understand his homework. He knew it was taught in class, but his head couldn’t wrap around the subject. All he knew was that he hated math.

Throwing down his pencil, Soonyoung grabbed his head and ruffled his hair in frustration. He groaned, not happy with all the numbers spinning around in his mind. The only thing to keep him calm and continue going on with his homework was the voice of Woozi.

There was no way Soonyoung was going to understand any of this, Jun was the one who always helped him with his homework. Leaning away from his desk, Soonyoung decides to take a small break. Tipping his head back, he stares at the walls of his bedroom. He gave himself a moment to concentrate on Woozi’s singing.

Soonyoung had was going to try again at his homework, about to tip his head back, but his door opening up made him stay in spot. Instead of the expected parent walking in, he sees Jun and Minghao making their way in. When he sees it’s them, he quickly rights his head and turns his chair to face them.

“Did my parents let you guys in?” Soonyoung asks as he takes off his earphones.

Minghao nods, “Your mom is going to make us some snacks.”

Tilting his head with confusion, Soonyoung continues on with his questions, “Why are you guys here?”

Not answering right away, Jun drags Minghao along with him to take over Soonyoung’s bed, “We’re here to do our homework of course. I’m sure you were taking a break cause you can’t understand anything, right?”

Soonyoung didn’t want to answer the question. Instead, he turned around to re-concentrate on his homework.

“If you have any questions, just ask, Minghao is taking the same math course. I’m helping him on the homework,” Jun said.

Soonyoung wanted to apologize but he was also stubborn. He’s always been stubborn with many things, like his year long crush, his attempt at being a secret admirer, and not apologizing for being so rude.

Still not starting anything to do with his homework, Soonyoung breathed in and out, knowing he just had to do it. He wanted to be able to talk to Jun again. If Jun could get over him being so rude, Soonyoung could get over his self-pride and apologize. 

Turning his chair around again, Soonyoung looked to his best friend. Jun was crouched over school books and notebooks, a pencil in hand, trying to explain all the numbers to a clueless looking Minghao.

A painful ache tortured his chest. He missed this sight so much, having his friends with him.

“Jun,” Soonyoung said, gaining the attention of his friend. It was only when both Jun and Minghao looked up that Soonyoung continued, “I know I’ve been very hard to deal with, acting like a child, not facing my realities, being super rude. I just didn’t know what to do. I’ve never been in a situation like this before. Wonwoo was my first real crush, the first real guy I asked out, and the first real guy to turn me down after I found out he was kind of cheating on me. I should have turned to my friends for help, but I was too stubborn and embarrassed. I got angry at you guys instead, and became very unstable. I know it took me forever, but I see it now. I- I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything that has been happening.”

Jun gets off the bed after Soonyoung is done talking and walks over. Grabbing Soonyoung’s upper half towards him, Jun hugs his best friend. 

It didn’t take long for Soonyoung to wrap his arms around Jun’s torso. Jun didn’t mind when he felt wetness on his shirt.


	8. Your Secret Admirer 8

It was the morning of the talent show. Soonyoung was busy running around, making sure everything was perfect. They had already perfected their stage outfits, but Soonyoung wanted to double check everything. It also had to done soon. The student staff, who had set up the whole talent show, wanted to do a rehearsal to make sure there would be no mistakes. It was technically a dry rehearsal, but the student staff still wanted all performers to show up.

Jun and Minghao had slept over. Soonyoung wanted to run through their song a few times again to make sure they were perfect. Which they were. The pair knew better than to mess around with something Soonyoung was passionate in, so they went along with whatever he wanted. 

The plan was to just stay at school after rehearsals. They were given an empty classroom to practice in, and Soonyoung was going to take advantage of it. 

“Do you guys have everything?” Soonyoung asked as he stood ready by the door.

“Yes, Hyung,” Minghao said with a smile, holding his bag up to show Soonyoung, “Everything you reminded me to bring is in here. I double checked, Jun double checked, and you double checked as well.”

“I have everything,” Jun said before Soonyoung could ask him too.

“Okay,” Soonyoung said, nodding, “We’re all set. Let’s go!”

The trio goes to their rehearsal and everything goes smoothly. Every set of performers were called up the stage and their song or audio were played. Soonyoung’s group was second last. 

Afterwards, they were given the room number for the classroom they could get ready in. As soon as they arrived, Soonyoung had to make sure their outfits were ready.

“Okay guys,” Soonyoung said, clapping to get their attention, “Let’s bring out the outfits we decided on.”

Minghao, thinking it was best to empty everything from his bag, tipped the bag upside down making the contents fall all over the small desk. A belt and hat flew over the edge and onto the floor. “I brought everything you liked in my wardrobe, even the weird buttons you think will look nice on my jacket.”

“Good, good. You should pin them on for us to see,” Soonyoung said as he rummaged through his own bag.

Jun pulled out his own set of clothing, “I’m going to change into my outfit. And since we have time, I brought a book to read.”

“You still have the heart to read?” Soonyoung asked, not looking up, “I’m too nervous to do anything else.”

“Reading is what is going to calm my nerves,” Jun said as he took his clothes to a corner of the room.

“Have you guys seen my hat?” Soonyoung asked.

“The one you have on your head?” Minghao asked back, pointing to his own head.

Shaking his head, Soonyoung continued to rummage through his bag, “Not that one. I had another hat in mind to use.”

“Do you mean the one you put by the door, so you would remember it when we left?” Jun asked.

Soonyoung looked up over to his friend, nodding his head, “Yeah that one.”

“I don’t remember you picking it up. I think you left it there,” Jun tells him.

“I can’t believe this. I forgot such an essential item.”

Minghao tsked, “Hyung, I can’t believe you. You choreographed part of the song around our hats, how could you forget.”

“Just go back for it real quick,” Jun tells him, “We still have a long time of waiting for the talent show to start and for it to be our turn. You’ll make it.”

Soonyoung saw no other way around it. Minghao was right, his hat was important. And as crazy as it sounded, he really wanted to use this certain hat. It was perfect to finish off his stage outfit. 

Telling his friends to just hang out while he was gone, Soonyoung left for his house. He wanted to make the trip quick.

Leaving the school’s ground, Soonyoung had nothing else on his mind other than his hat. About to pass the school, a voice made him stop. He had just past the school’s gates, and a alleyway was crowded with people. He wanted to keep going, knowing well to ignore all the students who felt like they were in real gangs. 

But it was Jihoon’s voice who made him stop.

“Leave the kid alone,” Jihoon was telling someone.

“Who are you to be telling me what to do with this kid?” someone Soonyoung didn’t know asked back.

“Me?” Jihoon continued to not back down, “I’m going to make you regret every decision you are making right now.”

“Hyung.”

Soonyoung froze as his eyes widened. He recognized that voice. Chan, Jeonghan’s kid brother who came with them to Twenty17.

What was he doing in these neighborhoods? And why were those older kids messing with him? And how did Jihoon get himself mixed up into it?

“Let him go,” Jihoon said in a snarl.

Soonyoung groaned internally. He knew it was serious, Jihoon only sounded like that when he was serious.

“We’re not letting him go till we’re all good and done with him,” another voice joined in.

The former voice chuckled with his friends, “That’s right. This is no place for a kid like him here. He should have known better to not come here.”

“If the rumors are right,” Jihoon said in a bored agitated voice, “You shouldn’t be here either. You should have graduated a year ago.”

“YAA!” the voice boomed out. “You think you’re so funny don’t you?”

“Not funny,” Jihoon went on, “but probably smarter.”

“I don’t care who you are. You’re going to get it today, for having such a loose mouth. You, you dim-wit, hold him.”

Soonyoung had heard enough. He didn’t want to hear or watch what was about to happen. Before he could even think about what he was doing, he was running.

Having been around Jihoon for a while now, Soonyoung didn’t even think as he wrapped himself around the shorter figure. Another second passed then he felt it, something made contact with his back, forcing him to find support in Jihoon’s small form.

“What is going on here?!” a new voice screamed.

“Run!” Soonyoung heard from those random voices.

He was being held in arms when he heard his voice being said out loud.

“Soonyoung. Soonyoung, you idiot. Why did you get in the way?”

 

When Soonyong came to, he wasn’t on the dirty ground like he expected. He was... he was in the school’s nursery. 

He could hear some yelling in the distance. Looking around at the room, he sees a figure sitting in a nearby chair.

“Minghao?” Soonyoung said in strain.

“Hyung!” Minghao looked away from his phone to greet Soonyoung, “You’re finally awake!”

“Who’s screaming out there?” Soonyoung asked, trying to figure out who the voices belonged to.

“Soonyoung-hyung!” A new voice screamed as it came closer. Chan had been sitting at the other side of the room and had ran when he heard Minghao.

The screaming outside stopped, and Soonyoung smiles when he sees Chan, “You’re okay then?”

“Why are you worried about me?” Chan pouted, “You were the one who got hurt.”

“It’s fine,” Soonyoung shrugged, “I’m still alive.”

“You should have seen Jun-hyung when he found out,” Chan continued at a fast pace, “He was livid. If the teachers and Minghao-hyung didn’t stop him, I’m sure he would have pummeled those guys.”

Minghao shook his head, “I’ve never seen him so angry before.”

“Where’s Jihoon?” Soonyoung asked, wondering where the irrational guy was.

Leaning in closer to Soonyoung, Minghao whispered to him, “He’s one of the screaming voices outside.”

Soonyoung wanted to know what Jihoon was screaming about, but he didn’t get the chance to ask. The door opens and a whole bunch of people walks in.

Leading them was Jun, with Jihoon right after him. Then came Jihoon’s friends, Jeonghan, Jisoo, and Seungcheol.

Jun went right up to him and glared at him, “You were supposed to go and get your hat. Not get mixed up in a fight.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but grin, he loved how his best friend cared for him so much.

Jun scoffs and rolls his eyes, “Why are you smiling?”

“I’m just glad to have you in my life,” Soonyoung tells him.

“If you want to keep me in your life, you should take care of yourself better.”

Soonyoung nods in agreement, “Okay. But did you guys get to go back for my hat? We still have to perform later.”

“Soonyoung,” Jun said with a sigh, “I don’t know how else to tell you this.”

“What-?” Soonyoung was going to ask what he meant but Jihoon walked in front of Jun. “Jihoon?”

Without wasting his chance, Jihoon said, “You won’t be able to participate.”

“I won’t be able to dance my routine?” Soonyoung asked, “But Jun and Minghao.”

Jun sighed from Jihoon’s side, “Not only did you suffer from a slight concussion, the nurse says you’re just all-round exhausted. She recommends you take it easy, and maybe even take a nap right now.”

“But our dance, the talent show.”

“It’s fine, Soon. We’ll find another way to get you your camera.”

Soonyoung slowly shook his head, knowing it would give him a headache if he went any faster, “I’ll be fine without the camera. But someone still has to fill up that spot. You guys should do it without me.”

Minghao pouted, shaking his own head, “How can we do it without you Hyung?”

“He’s right,” Jun said, “It’s your dance. It’s not complete without you.”

Soonyoung smiled, “It’s a good thing you guys have been secretly planning a different dance routine then.”

“Wha-” Jun said, looking flustered, “What do you mean?”

“You guys thought I wouldn’t notice,” Soonyoung said, “but I did. You guys have a whole new song I’ve never heard before, and a dance choreography that is plain art. If we can’t do my routine, I want everyone else to see the one you guys worked hard on.”

“Hyung,” Minghao whined.

“Is he talking about the song you worked on with my uncle?” Jihoon said asked Minghao.

Minghao turned to Jihoon and nodded, “Yeah.”

“Jihoon’s uncle?” Soonyoung asked, staring between the two.

Jeonghan smiled, “His uncle makes music. It would only make sense to work with such a genius.”

“He’s even helped me with some random stuff,” Seungcheol added.

“As you can see,” Soonyoung said, “You’re completely set to do your routine. We’ve just got to tell them it’s going to be a different song.”

Soonyoung tries to sit up, but he doesn’t get far. Jihoon is by him, pushing him slowly back down. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“To talk to the student staff. They have to know what is going on,” Soonyoung tries to explain.

Jihoon shakes his head, “You’re going to lay in this bed till you’re okay to leave. Jun and Minghao are big boys who can go explain the situation. Seungcheol and the others can go with them.”

“You’re going to go with them too?” Soonyoung asked, trying to not care too much.

“I’m a bit tired, so I’ll be resting here for a while,” Jihoon said back, looking at Soonyoung in the eyes.

“Stay,” Jisoo said with a small smile, “Everything will be fine.”

“Chan will stay too!” Chan holds up his hand, volunteering himself.

“Chan will most definitely not be staying,” Jeonghan said, glaring at his brother, “You came for the talent show, you will see the talent show.”

“But Hyung!” Chan said in a pout, “I want to stay with Soonyoung-hyung.”

“Jihoon is staying with Soonyoung,” Jeonghan went on, “Plus, Soonyoung is going to rest. It is going to be boring, and you’re going to whine later on about missing the show. You can hang out with him later.”

Huffing, Chan slowly nodded, looking like he was in pain.

Soonyoung chuckled, “You should go see the show, Chan. I’m sure you’re going to love it. And Jun and Minghao will enjoy having you in the crowd.”

“Are you sure you’re going to be fine Jihoon?” Seungcheol said, speaking up, “I could stay to keep you company when Soonyoung sleeps.”

Jihoon smiles and shakes his head, “I’ll be fine Seungcheol. I may even take a small nap myself, you know how I don’t sleep all that well either.”

“You do need to sleep more,” Seungcheol sighed.

“We should go,” Jisoo said, gaining the attention of everyone, “It’s already getting close to the start of the talent show, and we have a lot to do to change just four minutes in this talent show.”

Jun nods, “We’ll come back after the show, Soonyoung. Just rest and don’t worry about anything.”

Soonyoung smiles back, knowing Jun could see the sadness behind it, “You guys are going to do great out there.”

Jun grins, “Of course we are. We have the best dancer guiding us.”

Minghao joins Jun and smiles just as wide, “We’re going to make you proud of us Hyung!”

 

Soonyoung doesn’t know how long he’s been asleep for. All he remembers is Jihoon telling him to rest, and how he would wake him up if they needed to leave for any reason.

He wakes up himself up, as his mind was never really at ease. Laying in his position, Soonyoung listens to his surrounding. He wasn’t sure if he was ready to wake up and talk to Jihoon. He also wasn’t sure if he was ready to ask himself why he wanted to know what was going on between Jihoon and Seungcheol. Soonyoung wasn’t ready to be interested in anyone at the moment.

A few minutes of lying comfortably quiet, Soonyoung hears something. Someone was softly singing. And after listening to it more, Soonyoung realized it wasn’t just anyone, it was Woozi.


	9. Your Secret Admirer 9

Soonyoung knew he had to pretend to wake up. He just had to. Groaning, he brought out his arms to stretch. The singing stops.

“You’re awake,” Jihoon said to him.

“Were you singing?” Soonyoung asked, sitting up slowly to look at Jihoon.

“Listening to some music,” Jihoon said, lifting his phone up.

Soonyoung, however, knew it was a lie. He knows what music from phones sounded like. But he also knew he wouldn’t push Jihoon any further. If he wasn’t ready to say anything, then Soonyoung wouldn’t make him say it.

“It was a good song,” Soonyoung said with a small smile, “What time is it?”

“It’s getting pretty late. The nurse did stop by, she said you could leave when you woke up. We can still make it to Jun’s and Minghao’s performance if we leave now.”

Without even thinking about it, Soonyoung moves to stand up from the bed. “Let’s go then.”

 

Once they reach the crowd, Soonyoung had to slow himself down. He didn’t realize how badly the boutrous noise and cluttered floor was going to affect him. At one point he stops himself and wonders if he should just go back to the nursery. It was a lot safer, and no one was there. He could always ask Jun and Minghao to perform for him later.

Soonyoung frowned, he wanted to see them perform it for the first time in front of an audience though. It does something to a performer and their performance, Soonyoung wanted to witness that miracle happening to his friends.

He was about to turn back when a hand held onto his own. Soonyoung looks down at his hand, and brings up his gaze to whoever it was holding it. His eyes land on a blinking Jihoon and his heart pulsed irregularly. 

Jihoon tilted his head and leaned up. Without needing to be forced down, Soonyoung leaned towards the shorter guy.

“I know where Seungcheol and the others are. They have a pretty good spot.”

Only after Soonyoung nodded the approval of finding Jihoon’s friends did Jihoon start dragging Soonyoung through the crowd. And Soonyoung focused on Jihoon’s hand in his own, trying to forget the crowd and the noise.

He doesn’t let go, even when they stop. Soonyoung looks up to Jihoon, wondering if they had made it. Only when he sees the four people who have barged into his life along with Jihoon, does he let go. It all still confused him to no end. 

The thought of someone like Jihoon following him around made Soonyoung wonder about himself. Soonyoung didn’t see himself as anything special to have someone or anyone liking him. And when he thought about the new fact he just learnt, it made his mind whirl even more. Jihoon, who had been nothing but harsh, who sings like an angel, followed him around and held his hand when none of their friends were around. 

How was this possible?

For the last year, Soonyoung had done nothing but dance and be infatuated with his crush. And prior to that year, Soonyoung had done nothing but dance and tried his best to make it through the school years. So why and how did Jihoon know of him and become as interested as he was?

Soonyoung was brought out of his thoughts when Jeonghan smiled their way.

“You guys made it!” Jeonghan waved them over, “Your friends are going to be on next.”

Chan bounced his way over to Soonyoung with his huge smile, “If their performance is anything like their practice, it’s going to be epic.”

Soonyoung sighed, “Am I going to be the last person in this group to see my own friends perform this song?”

Jihoon nodded, “I think so.”

Blinking, Soonyoung didn’t even want to ask, he was sure Minghao and Jun had already performed for him. After this event, he was going to have a talk with his friends, they kept way too many secrets.

Ignoring all of them, Soonyoung faced the stage. The MC’s were saying their final thoughts, leaving for the next performance. The stage went dark, and the crowd went silent. 

Music filled the air, and lights lit up the stage. Two figures appeared. They were connected, a string holding them together by the wrist. 

Soonyoung almost forgot how to breath as he watched magic happen in front of him. In the moment, the two dancers weren’t his friends, they were art.

 

The performance ended, and Soonyoung couldn’t wait to see his friends. Not sticking around to see the last stage, Soonyoung turned to leave the crowd. But a hand in his made him stop. Looking back to see Jihoon, Soonyoung frowned in curiosity. 

“Let’s go,” Jihoon tells him, “I want to see Minghao and Jun too.”

Without waiting to hear a complaint, Jihoon leads them away to the backstage. 

Soonyoung wanted to be mad, having Jihoon take his hand so many times that day. But he couldn’t be mad, and it confused him even more. He wanted nothing more than to be uncomfortable with the guy who basically stalked him, but Jihoon wasn’t that guy anymore. He wasn’t even the guy who had an unhealthy obsession over Soonyoung anymore, and Soonyoung knew this. After spending time with Jihoon, Soonyoung could see how much Jihoon wanted to be part of his whole life, and not just be his only life.

Again, only after Jihoon stops in his tracks, does Soonyoung realize they are in the presence of their friends. Jun and Minghao are standing in front of them, staring down at their intertwined hands. 

Soonyoung slowly pulls away from Jihoon’s grasp. And even if it does bother him, Jihoon doesn’t show it, smiling at the two in front of them.

“You guys were amazing,” Jihoon tells them.

Minghao automatically smiles back and walks closer to Jihoon, “It was all thanks to you, who pushed me to make the song. I couldn’t have done it without you.”

Smiling, Soonyoung notices Jun and Minghao holding hands too. He knows Jun is happy with his own situation, but something had seemed to change. It was seen on stage, and it was here too, in front of him.

“I don’t know why you guys tried to hide this from me,” Soonyoung said, pouting to his friends, “Everything was so amazing.”

“Thank you,” Jun said with a wide smile, “It was Minghao’s wish to keep it a secret. He wanted to surprise you and everyone with it. But we had to show it off pretty early, unexpectedly.”

Minghao pulls Jihoon to the side to talk about some musical aspects, and it leaves Jun all to Soonyoung. 

“There’s something about you, Jun,” Soonyoung said, smirking.

“What do you mean?” Jun chuckles, “Nothing's different.”

“You’re a bad liar,” Soonyoung tells his friend, “I can see the sparkle in your eyes, and the way you float everywhere, and the way you laugh now.”

“Okay, okay,” Jun said with a never ending smile, stopping Soonyoung from continuing, “Something did happen.”

“I knew it,” Soonyoung said, hugging Jun.

Only when Soonyoung lets go of Jun does he tell him, “Minghao will know I would have told you already. This song, he wrote it for us. He made up his mind. We’re together with a title that connects us now.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help himself, he grabbed Jun’s cheeks between his hands and moved it back and forth, “Congrats! I’m so happy for you, my best friend.”

“Let go of me,” Jun said with a struggle.

Soonyoung lets goes of Jun’s cheeks, but then he is caught in the arms of Minghao. 

“Hyung,” Minghao said loudly into his ear, “Did you force it out of Jun already?”

“I didn’t force Jun to say anything,” Soonyoung laughs as he turns in Minghao’s arm to hug him back. “I’m glad it’s you and Jun. I couldn’t see it any other way.”

“It was only after seeing you and Jihoon that I was okay with it,” Minghao tells him.

Soonyoung pulls out of the hug and stares at Minghao, “What do you mean?”

“You don’t see it yet, do you?” Minghao said, “You’re meant for each other, if only you would give it a chance. And I didn’t want to let my fears make us lose that chance.”

Shaking his head, Soonyoung loses his smile, “I don’t think so, Minghao. I know you’re being nice about it, but I don’t think so.”

“Maybe after seeing Jun and me together, you will see it too,” Minghao said before he turned to Jun.

Jihoon walks up to him and looks at him with curiosity, “What did Minghao say to you? You’ve lost your smile.”

“Nothing,” Soonyoung said, trying to smile.

 

“We have to celebrate,” Chan screamed at the group, “We have to, don’t we, Jeonghan-hyung, Seungcheol-hyung. You guys are the oldest, make them celebrate!”

Jeonghan laughs, “Calm down, kid. Jisoo is already one step ahead of you.”

“The youngest has spoken,” Seungcheol said, smiling, “We’re all going out to celebrate.”

“Of course!” Soonyoung said, throwing his arms around Jun and Minghao’s shoulder, “My best friends just won, we have to celebrate!”

 

The group of friends were just settling into a booth, looking at menus, when they were interrupted. 

“Hey, Soonyoung,” a deep voice said.

Soonyoung looks up from his menu to see someone who he didn’t expect to see in a long time, “Wonwoo.”

“Are you okay? You didn’t perform,” Wonwoo said, looking actually worried.

“I’m fine,” Soonyoung said, looking away.

“I think it’s best if you left us alone,” Jun said, speaking up.

Wonwoo nods, “I’m just glad to see you’re okay.”

Only after Wonwoo leaves to his own booth does Soonyoung sigh out of relieve.

“What was that all about?” he cringes, “It’s not like we were even serious.”

“That is the reason why you guys would have never worked out,” Seungcheol said, shaking his head, “Everything that guy does is in his own interest. He doesn’t really care about others, he just needs to be seen as the most important.”

Soonyoung looked at Seungcheol, wondering what he meant. Wasn’t it Seungcheol who wanted to make sure he and Wonwoo were serious, so the future wasn’t bothered. 

“Whatever happened to those guys, anyways, “ Soonyoung asked, not wanting to dwell on any issues that dealt with Wonwoo. “Those guys who were messing with Chan?”

“They were caught of course,” Jisoo tells him, “Jihoon knew who they were. The principal had taken care of it. I think they might be getting expelled, for harming another student and civilians.”

“Good,” Chan said with a flushed face, “They deserve it.”

“The talent show is free for all people to come watch,” Jihoon said shrugging, “It’s not just for our student body. What they were doing was out of terms.”

“Thankfully Soonyoung was there to be a hero,” Seungcheol said with a smile, “Otherwise our Jihoonie would have been hurt.”

“This Jihoonie would have been fine,” Jihoon said through gritted teeth, “He didn’t need a hero.”

“But Soonyoung is and has been your hero,” Jeonghan said with a song like voice.

“What are you guys talking about?” Soonyoung asks, looking back and forth between them all.

“Nothing,” Jisoo sighs, “Don’t listen to their talking. They’re always like this, saying nonsense.”

It didn’t sound like nonsense to Soonyoung though. And he wanted to know what they were going on about, especially if they were talking about him. 

A waiter walks up to them at this point and introduces himself, “Hi, my name is Ren. I’ll be helping you guys tonight. Are you guys ready to order?”

Minghao smiles up and nods his head, “Yes, I would like some fried chicken.”

The smile on Ren’s lips falters.

Jun turns to Minghao, smiling, “Minghao, if you wanted fried chicken, you should have told us. They don’t serve fried chicken here.”

 

“We have a gift for you,” Jun said, staring at Soonyoung.

They had finished their meals and were just about to leave for the night. Minghao also turned to Soonyoung, smiling.

“What more could you guys possibly give to me today?” Soonyoung asked his friends. 

Minghao brings up the winning prize from the talent show. It was a camera in a box with a red ribbon around it. Sliding it across the table, Minghao makes it stop right in front of Soonyoung.

“It’s yours,” Minghao said with a smile.

Soonyoung shakes his head, “I can’t take it. I didn’t really win it.” He pushes the box back to Minghao.

“We went into this talent show for one reason,” Jun said, “It was to win you that prize. Minghao and I don’t need it. It’s for you, to film our dances. Just take it, with a promise to film our dance. I want to see it on your new youtube channel.”

“You mean our new youtube channel,” Minghao added.

Jun nods, “Our new youtube channel.”

“Are you guys serious?” Soonyoung asks the two.

“Super serious,” Minghao replies.

A wide smile spreads on Soonyoung’s lips, “Thanks, you guys. Did I ever mention how much I love you guys. Like, you guys are literally the best friends ever. If I could, I would kiss you. I would.”

Jun’s face distorted in disgust, “No, Soonyoung. Don’t kiss the friends.”

“Okay, okay,” Soonyoung said, laughing.

“Soonyoung,” Jeonghan calls to him, “I can’t help but overhear. And I have to ask. Is it okay if I film your first video? I’m going into filmography, and it would be great practice for me.”

“And I want to edit the video,” Jisoo said, volunteering next, “It would be good practice for me too, since I’m going into editing.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but stare in amazement. They really were all artistic students. No wonder Jihoon hung out with them. 

It all made him feel very untalented though. While they all knew the professions they were going into, he didn’t have a clue what his future was made of yet. Sure, Soonyoung did have his dancing, but it would only take him so far. 


	10. Your Secret Admirer 10

**Jun: Where are you? Everyone is here. We’re all waiting on you.**

Soonyoung hadn’t been sleeping well. When does he ever... They were going to be filming their first dance video, and he worried about getting their dance right. He knew they were perfect, but what if a bird flew in and it messed them all up, or if someone accidently slipped and they all had to go to the hospital. There were too many scenarios that could make the whole day ruined. 

Jun had gone with him to scout out the filming site, and they were happy with Han River. They figured Jeonghan could get some cool shots with the scenery. Even Jeonghan was happy when he was told of where they were going. Everyone was feeling good about the day. Everyone but Soonyoung.

Tieing up his shoes, Soonyoung yells out to his parents that he was leaving for the day. Texting Jun real quick, he grabs his bike and starts pedalling. 

“Finally,” Seungcheol sighed, “Everyone was seriously getting worried. Minghao and Jihoon were ready to go and find you themselves.”

Soonyoung just smiles and shakes out his damp hair. “Sorry.”

After placing his bike with all the other bikes around him, Soonyoung grabs his camera out of his backpack and gives it to Jeonghan. Jeonghan had showed him a lot of the features, but Soonyoung was going to trust him to film however he wanted today.

“As I’ve mentioned before,” Jeonghan said to the group as he fumbled with the camera, “we only have one camera, so we’ll be needing to do the choreography more than once. I don’t expect each take to be perfect, but it would be nice, for the editing to go smoother. It’s going to be a long day so we need everyone to concentrate.”

“Hyung, you’re not a director just yet,” Chan whined.

“Kid,” Jeonghan said, pulling Chan into a playful armhold, “For today, I am. You should just be glad I let you tag along with us.”

“Jeonghan is right, though,” Soonyoung said, nodding, “We’re going to have to concentrate for this to go smoothly. Is everyone ready?”

Jun and Minghao nods, both of them waiting for him. Jeonghan stares at the tiny screen a little longer before he’s satisfied and nods as well.

Chan is holding onto a speaker and phone, waiting for his cue. When the three are in spot, Soonyoung gives him the nod.

“Okay hyungs, three, two, one,” Chan counted down before hitting play.

Woozi’s song fill the air, and Soonyoung let all his worries fly away as he does what he loves.

 

A few dances in and Jihoon made them all stop for a break. No one questions it as they all scatter to find some food and drinks. Soonyoung is left alone, standing in his spot, confused as to why they all decided to have a break so fast. 

“Why did you stop the filming?” Soonyoung asked the only person still standing around.

Jihoon sighed and walked over with the camera Jeonghan handed to him before fleeing with Jisoo and Chan. “If you saw your facial expression, you wouldn’t want it being captured as well.”

Soonyoung watched in curiosity as Jihoon replayed the last clip Jeonghan had filmed. The three were dancing on point, and Jun and Minghao maintained a good facial feature, but Soonyoung was looking lost. While he thought he was being serious about the dance, he was actually drowning in worries.

“Why do you look as if someone stole your pet dog?” Jihoon asked him.

Sitting down on the cement, Soonyoung covered his face with his hands. He was embarrassed for showing that facial expression in front of all his friends. 

“No wonder everyone disappeared. I looked like I didn’t want to be here, or for anyone of us to be here,” Soonyoung sighed into his hands. 

Despite hearing Jihoon sit down in front of him, Soonyoung didn’t move away. Jihoon was the only one to stay, and Soonyoung honestly needed someone to talk to.

“What’s going on?” Jihoon asked.

“I-I’m scared of what I’m doing. What this means for my future, for Jun’s and Minghao’s. They’re blindly following me with my hobby. What if what I’m doing get them nowhere in life and they hate me for it later. And what am I actually doing anyways? Where is all this dancing going to get me?” Once Soonyoung started he couldn’t stop. “I mean, Jeonghan and Jisoo knows what they’re doing with their future. I’m sure Seungcheol knows what he’s doing too. You even have an amazing future with your art. And here I am, not even sure if I can make a future with my dancing, and I’m dragging my friends along down with me.”

Jihoon had yet to say anything, just staring at Soonyoung. He studied the boy in front of him, watching him regain his normal breathing pattern, waiting for him to calm down. And once it seemed like it, he finally spoke.

“Jun and Minghao are not kids, you do not need to feel like you are in need of taking charge of their futures. They know what they are doing. And I do think you know what you want to do with your future, you’re just scared. It’s normal to be scared, especially when something means that much to you. Soonyoung, you love dancing. You’ve loved dancing for such a long time, and you’re really good at it. If you want to take it seriously, there are options. There are so many options if you want to continue dancing.”

As much as his friends knew he was in love with dancing, they never really talked seriously with him about it. And his parents thought it was a phase, thinking he would discover something more respectable sooner or later. No one had ever told him he had options in the dancing world. Hearing it from someone like Jihoon made Soonyoung think that maybe there may just be a word like happiness in the future.

“You really think so?” Soonyoung asked, feeling hopeful but still doubtful at the same time.

Jihoon scoffed, “I know it. Plus, if you really want, I have connections. A dance studio, an entertainment industry, a dance group that would kill to have talent like yours. You don’t see it, but there are people out there willing to pay you money for your skills.”

Soonyoung frowned, “How does a art student have so many connections?”

“Family,” Jihoon said shrugging, “and I’m serious. All you have to do is ask, and I will set up a meeting.”

“Are you just doing this cause you claim to like me?” Soonyoung said, standing up, brushing away any dirt on his pants.

Jihoon stands up as well and glares at Soonyoung, “I do like you, and yes, I am doing this for that reason. Why? Does it feel like it’s not for your skills and talent alone? Cause these people I know will never take you in without seeing what you’re capable of first.”

“I was just wondering,” Soonyoung said, shrugging himself. 

Beyond Jihoon’s shoulder, he see’s Jun and Minghao making their way back. Waving at his friends, seeing their arms full, Soonyoung goes to greet them.

 

They eat their snacks and get back to work. This time things run more smoothly. Soonyoung is concentrated, knowing he was going to be okay. He knew he was going to take his time with his new youtube account, building up his dance credentials. He knew he was going to have to convince his parents his goals were worth it. He knew was going to try to make it on his own. But he also knew he had someone like Jihoon to fall back on. He really did love to dance.

Jeonghan called for one more take, wanting to get an angle of Minghao he had not yet gotten. Once he was happy with what he had, he called it a day. 

Chan had been complaining about hunger for the last 30 minutes already. He wouldn’t even quiet down when Jeonghan told him he shouldn’t have asked to linger around all day. Only when Jisoo decided it was best to feed the child did the group head to a fast food joint. 

Jun and Minghao didn’t mind, since they were hungry as well. Soonyoung wanted Jisoo to start editing, but he knew he couldn’t force the guy to forgo food, so he went along too. And wherever Jihoon went, Seungcheol followed.

They settled on pizza, and Minghao didn’t ask for chicken this time. 

At the end of the night, Jeonghan and Jisoo bid them all a goodnight, leaving with a well-fed Chan. Jun and Minghao were waiting on Soonyoung, and Jihoon was waiting on Seungcheol.

Seungcheol had pulled Soonyoung to the side, after their meal was paid for, wanting a word.

“I was wondering if you were free tomorrow, so we could talk,” Seungcheol tells him.

Blinking in confusion, Soonyoung couldn’t decide what he wanted to say. He rarely talked to Seungcheol, and they only hung out when Seungcheol decided to cling around Jihoon. Why should the two of them have a conversation alone?

Seungcheol sighs with impatience, “Hurry it up. I don’t want Jihoon to know about this. But knowing him, he will figure it out. And no, I’m not going to murder you. I just need to talk.”

“Is Jihoon going to be there?” Soonyoung couldn’t help but to ask.

“No. It’s the reason why I don’t want him knowing I’m asking. It’s serious, otherwise I wouldn’t even bother asking.”

Taking this in, Soonyoung couldn’t see the harm in it. If this talk had anything to do with Jihoon, he wanted to learn more about the guy. “Okay. The park by the school. I’ll be there by 12pm.”

“Okay,” Seungcheol said with a small smile, “Thanks, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

And with that, Soonyoung leaves with his friends.

 

The next day Soonyoung stuffs his mouth with breakfast, running late again. He wasn’t sure how long this talk was going to be and he didn’t want to end up hungry through the middle of it. Throwing on his shoes, he yells his goodbyes to his parents. Since he didn’t have Seungcheol’s phone number, he really couldn’t text him of his late arrival. Knowing this, he runs even faster to make it to the park.

When Soonyoung reaches the park, sweating and panting, he finds Seungcheol sitting at a bench. Taking calm steps over to the guy, Soonyoung couldn’t help but be nervous now. He tried his best to not care too much all night and all morning, but now in front of Seungcheol he couldn’t help but worry about what he was about to learn.

“Sorry I’m late,” Soonyoung said as he sat down next to Seungcheol.

Seungcheol turns to him and chuckles, “After yesterday I’m not surprised. And it’s fine, Jihoon tends to make me wait too.”

Soonyoung nods, “What was it that you wanted to talk about?”

Shaking his head with a sigh, Seungcheol says, “You really are getting right to the point aren’t you?”

Rubbing the back of his neck, Soonyoung’s face crinkles up, “Sorry. We’ve never really talk to each other outside of our friends group. I really don’t know what to say.”

“It’s fine,” Seungcheol said with a sad smile, “I kind of figured this talk was going to be uncomfortable.”

“Uncomfortable?” Soonyoung asks.

Seungcheol lightly nods, “I have something to confess.”


	11. Your Secret Admirer 11

“You have something to confess?” Soonyoung asked with confusion. What could Seungcheol possibly have to say to him?

With a sigh, Seungcheol nodded, “I do. And I completely understand if you hate me afterwards. I deserve it. The person who I plotted with and I deserve any kind of spiteful words you may have.”

Soonyoung leaned away from Seungcheol defensively, throwing out his hands to calm him down. “Woah. Let’s hear what happened first, then I’ll see if I become angry or not.”

“I don’t know,” Seungcheol said with a dramatic sigh, “Maybe you should hit me first. It’ll make it easier for me to say it.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but laugh now. Seungcheol was turning out way differently than he expected. “You’re thinking way too much, Seungcheol. Just tell me.”

“Okay, okay,” Seungcheol said as he turned to Soonyoung, “Here it is. Jeonghan and I forced Jihoon into having this persona of an obsessive person, just so he could somehow find a way into your life.”

Quiet filled the air between them as Soonyoung lost all his laughter, and Seungcheol waited to see if he would get a punch to the face. 

Blinking, Soonyoung took it all in. He opened his mouth to say something but closed it when he wasn’t satisfied with what he was going to say. What did that really mean? Who was Jihoon then? And how was he normally?

Soonyoung turned to Seungcheol and scrunched up his face in confusion, “Could you repeat what you just said. Maybe use different words so I can try to understand?”

“Jihoon kept talking about you, and it went on and on and on without anything happening,” and now Seungcheol was rambling, “So Jeonghan and I devised up a plan for him to get into your life. It was all Jeonghan really. We all knew you liked Wonwoo. And we all watched you as you planned out your secret admirer plan. Jeonghan thought it would be a good idea to steal your notes so Wonwoo wouldn’t get them. And when we did that, we realized we had to do something. But Jihoon wasn’t confident enough to just come out and say he liked you and it was us stealing your notes. So we told him he should just barge in and claim you. He’s liked you longer, he shouldn’t wait any longer, and he caved.”

Still unsure of what to say, Soonyoung contemplated the new stream of information he was getting. But Jeonghan? He was such a nice guy. How could he plan all that, telling Jihoon how to barge into someone else’s life? And Jihoon? Jihoon actually couldn’t bring up the courage to confess himself? He had to take really bad pointers from his friends?

What was going on? 

“You’re serious?” Soonyoung asked.

With huge puppy eyes, Seungcheol nodded, “We just wanted something to happen between the two of you. He’s liked you for such a long time. And it hurts when he hurts, Jihoon has been my friend since the beginning of time. I just wanted to see him happy. But the both of you are anything but happy.”

“You don’t like Jihoon?” Soonyoung continued with his questions, “I thought you liked Jihoon.”

Seungcheol looked at him with confusion.

So Soonyoung went on further, “The one time we were at Twenty17, and I was on my date with Wonwoo, you were overly protective of Jihoon.”

“Ahh,” Seungcheol exclaimed, remembering, “You were with Wonwoo, I may have acted like a jerk. Sorry. Also, there was a time before you showed up when I thought I had feelings for Jihoon, but he’s like a brother to me. My younger brother. I’ve only had real older brothers, so to have Jihoon as my younger brother, it means a lot. Plus, after he found out about you, he’s changed so much. Even after finally getting into your life, he’s changed. All for the better, and I’m sure it’s all because of you.”

Soonyoung frowned, “I was meaning to ask you about that. You said the Jihoon I first met isn’t the real Jihoon. So what is Jihoon really like?”

Seungcheol nodded, “I wish I could fully explain it, but I can’t. The Jihoon nowadays is more similar to the Jihoon I know. It’s like he started to care less about forcing his way into your life, cause you were kind of accepting him in anyways. And I can’t really say more, it should really be Jihoon you should be talking to.”

There was another moment of silence between them as Soonyoung was lost in thought. Everything was starting to make sense now. Of course not everything, but a lot of it. Flashbacks of his memories with Jihoon in them came rushing back and he couldn’t believe how long it’s been since Jihoon has been in his life.

With a sigh, Soonyoung says, “I wish I could say that I am angry, and I am. Those first few days and weeks was full of stressing out with anger. And in all honesty, I was more so confused. I couldn’t figure out what I had done to deserve someone bothering me so. I’m nothing special. But the thing is, as annoying as Jihoon was at the beginning, I actually am glad to have met him. He’s become a good friend.”

Seungcheol started to smile, eye smile and gummy smile, it was all over his face. “Does this mean there is a possible chance you could like him?”

Soonyoung’s heart thumped against his chest, all facial expression falling away. He really wasn’t ready to even think of that possibility yet. Shaking his head slightly, Soonyoung tells Seungcheol, “I don’t think I can say anything about that. Nothing between Jihoon and I have been honest. If anything, I’ll give him the chance to clear everything up, but it has to be between him and me.”

Even though Seungcheol had lost his smile for a second, he brought it back, “You’re giving him a chance to clear it up. And that is everything I wanted to hear. You’re a good guy, Soonyoung. I’m glad it was you Jihoon decided to like.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but grimace, “Why does he like me? I’m nothing special. I haven’t done anything. I never even met him personally till he came into my life.”

A chuckle came from Seungcheol, and Soonyoung looked over with disbelief. What could be so funny about the situation to make him laugh. Soonyoung couldn’t understand Seungcheol.

Seungcheol’s laughter was interrupted by his cellphone dinging. Taking it out of his pocket, Seungcheol checked his message. When he was done reading it, he looked over to Soonyoung, “Sorry. I’m needed elsewhere. I’m glad we had this talk though. I’m glad I could get this off my chest, I’ve been feeling pretty bad about it for awhile. Jeonghan was too, and he wanted to let you know he’s sorry too. He’s helping Jisoo with editing at the moment.”

Soonyoung nodded, “I’m glad we had this talk too. I mean, you guys basically messed up my life, but at least I know the reason why now. I won’t be walking around a totally confused mess all the time anymore.”

They both stand up from the bench. Seungcheol stretched his limbs out, while Soonyoung shuffles his feet waiting for them to say goodbye. Soonyoung looks up at Seungcheol and the guy is smiling again.

“Why are you smiling so much?” Soonyoung asked.

This only made Seungcheol smile wider, “I’m just happy. You have no idea how happy you make Jihoon, and a happy Jihoon makes me happy. Also, I wanted to thank you.”

“Thank me?”

Seungcheol nods, “You saved Jihoon. In a lot more ways than you can imagine.”

 

Instead of going back home right away, Soonyoung makes his way to Jun’s. It was way past 1pm, and he figured his best friend would be up and about already. Soonyoung needed someone to talk to, especially after everything he was just told.

Letting himself in, he says hi to Jun’s parents before heading to Jun’s bedroom. 

“I thought I heard you,” Jun said, facing the door which Soonyoung just opened up.

“Hey,” Soonyoung said with a small wave, “I need someone to talk to.”

“Come on in,” Jun said, gesturing to his bed, “Therapist Jun will be with you in a second.”

“Ha ha, Jun,” Soonyoung mocked back, closing the door and making his way to the bed, “I’m serious.”

Jun shrugged, “I know you are. I just wanted to lighten up the mood before it got serious.”

Sighing, Soonyoung lays fully on his back.

“It’s really serious, isn’t it?” Jun asked, after seeing how Soonyoung was reacting.

“It’s really serious,” Soonyoung confirms.

“What did he do this time?” Jun asked with a irked voice.

Soonyoung shook his head, “It wasn’t Jihoon. Seungcheol and I had a talk. He and Jeonghan... The both of them... They...”

“What did they do?” Jun asked, “Do I have to have a talk to Jihoon about his friends? Do I have to have a talk with Seungcheol and Jeonghan?”

“Everything,” Soonyoung started again after Jun was done talking, “Everything from the beginning. Jihoon was eager to get into my life, but his obsessive quality was forced by the two of them.”

“You’re serious?” Jun said with slight frustration.

“I know, I know,” Soonyoung said with sigh, “The whole situation still sucks. I wish none of it happened. I wish Jihoon would have just approached me without the help of his friends. Or I wish his friends didn’t give such bad advice. I mean, seriously, who makes a person do that? Even if they were all desperate.”

“Wha-What does this mean?” Jun asked, “Are you still going to be friends with them?”

Soonyoung rolled over with a groan, “I don’t know. I... I don’t know.”

“And Jihoon?” Jun reluctantly asked.

“Jihoon?” Soonyoung said into his arm, “He’s the biggest I don’t know.”

They sat in quiet, the both of them lost in their own thoughts. 

Randomly, an image of Jihoon came to Soonyoung. It was the first time they came face to face. Soonyoung had thought he was going to finally get the chance to talk to his crush, but he turned around to Jihoon instead. 

Soonyoung could feel himself heating up with the memory of ‘you are mine’ being whispered into his ear. Remembering the thing that happened next made him whine out loud. Why was he thinking of something like that. Who wanted to remember being kissed by someone he didn’t even know? Soonyoung let out another whine, kicking air, as he remember kissing Jihoon back.

“What is wrong with you?” Jun asked, trying to bring Soonyoung out of his own mind, “Did you come here to just throw a tantrum on my bed?”

Soonyoung rolled to his back again, huffing and puffing. “What should I do, Jun?”

“I really wish I could tell you,” Jun said, moving to sit next to Soonyoung, “Right now though, you need to figure out how you feel about everything. How you feel about Jihoon. You used to be so adamant on getting rid of him, now you just let him into your personal space whenever he likes. You should figure out what it is going to be.”

Soonyoung went quiet again. Jun was only stating the obvious, but it still caused a storm in Soonyoung’s mind. He went back and forth between the two choices all the time. Who cared what he thought he knew of Jihoon. Jihoon had forced himself selfishly into someone else’s life. Whether with help from friends or not, it wasn’t right. 

But then Soonyoung sighed and knew it wasn’t like that anymore. Jihoon wasn’t selfish, he took care of not only him but of Jun and Minghao as well. And he wasn’t obsessive, Jihoon hung around people who he cared about. Even Soonyoung had to admit it.

 

It was late at night and Soonyoung was laying in his own bed. He should have been asleep by now but his mind wouldn’t let him completely turn off for the night. One person kept running around his thoughts, whispering to him.

When Soonyoung couldn’t sleep in the past he always turned to Woozi’s videos. Opening up the Youtube app and typing in Woozi was an automatic movement for him. So it wasn’t a surprise to him when he had the app running and a video one tap away from playing. 

As the song played into his ear, Soonyoung was transported back to the school’s nursery bed. He didn’t want to believe it, but it was all there. The voice he heard. Although it was but a whisper, he could recognize the voice he listened to constantly. 

He was staring fiercely at the painted mask Woozi had on, wondering who it was under it. Although he had a good suspicion of who he was, Soonyoung still couldn’t help enjoying the mysteriousness of it all. 

His phone vibrated in his hand and a notification showed up. Minghao had texted him. But it was so late. Getting out of Youtube, he goes into his messages.

**Minghao: Hyung, I’m sorry. I gave Jihoon your phone number. He’s been asking for a while now. And he promised he wouldn’t do anything weird. Please talk to him so I can talk with Jun without being interrupted every 5 minutes.**

Unplugging his earphones, Soonyoung stared at the message. What did this mean? Was he going to get a unexpected message from Jihoon? Or was Jihoon going to do the really unexpected and call him?

**Unknown Number: This is Jihoon. Minghao told me your number. Is it okay if I called you?**

Soonyoung knew it was going to happen the moment he got Minghao’s message, but to actually get Jihoon’s message made Soonyoung nervous for some reason. His palms started to sweat and his could feel his heart test the limit of his chest. 

**Unknown Number: Can I?**

Nothing about this was good. It all felt too forced. Minghao needed Jihoon off his back. Jihoon wanted to talk with him. Soonyoung just wanted to listen to Woozi and fall asleep.

**Unknown Number: I guess you’re asleep. I’ll try another day.**

Groaning, Soonyoung laid on his back and started typing back a message.

**Soonyoung: Call me.**

In matter of minutes, the unknown number is calling him. 

Picking up, Soonyoung places the phone next to his ear. He didn’t have anything to say, so he just listened.

“Soonyoung?” the voice of Jihoon came through.

“I’m listening,” Soonyoung said back.

“So the thing is, we’re on summer break, and your first video filming ended too. I have no excuses to see you anymore. And um, I know we just saw each other yesterday, but I-I missed you.”


	12. Your Secret Admirer 12

“I know. I know it isn’t what you want to hear,” Jihoon tells him, “It’s just, Seungcheol told me you guys talked. And even if he didn’t tell me exactly what you guys talked about, I could already guess what it was.”

Jihoon stopped talking, and there was a moment of silence before he sighed.

Hearing how much of a hard time Jihoon was having made something pull at Soonyoung’s chest. It felt like someone had taken a hold of his heart and had decided to squeeze it for a long moment.

Before Soonyoung could think of something to say, Jihoon was already talking again.

“I... I just. I wanted to know if you’re okay, how you’re handling it all. ”

Soonyoung really didn’t want to get mad. He wanted to give Jihoon a chance to talk, and he knew he was going to. But hearing Jihoon worry about him, despite all that had happened, made him strangely irritated. Staring into the dark room, Soonyoung said, “If you are so worried about my well-being at the moment, maybe you shouldn’t have done what you did to me in the past.”

An awkward moment of silence filled up the void. 

Clenching up the hand he wasn’t using to hold his phone, Soonyoung squeezed his eyes shut. He had to calm his racing heart. Saying what he did, he knew it didn’t only hurt Jihoon, it also hurt himself to be so unkind. Soonyoung didn’t want to be mean, even if the other person was first. 

Releasing the tension in his hand, Soonyoung runs it through his hair. Knowing what he had to do, Soonyoung said, “I’m sorry. I know you were told to do a lot of that stuff.”

“You shouldn’t be sorry,” Jihoon tells him, “I should be the one to say sorry. And I am sorry. I’m sorry I actually agreed to doing what my idiotic friends told me to do. I’m sorry we took your notes. I’m sorry I faked everything from the beginning. And I’m especially sorry it took such a huge toll on you. You who used to smile so freely, you who used to happily skip through the halls, you who used to make the whole day brighter even if it was heavily raining out. I am so sorry I messed up your life.”

Soonyoung sighed, wishing he could run over to Jun’s house to talk to him. This was too much for him to handle in one day.

Jihoon continued, “I know I owe you a better explanation. I know I have a lot to come clean about. And I want to tell you all about them soon. I want you to know everything about me. And if you are willing, I want to get to know everything about you too.”

Even if Soonyoung was planning on giving Jihoon a chance to explain himself, it didn’t make it any easier to actually do it. Usually he just went along with his life and let Jihoon tag along. Now Soonyoung had to makes choices that included Jihoon in them. Just thinking of it made his heart race. 

“I do want to,” Soonyoung finally got out, “I want to hear your explanations for everything. But things have to be different this time around. I want to hear your stories from you and I want you to get your information on me from me. Also, I want you to decide where it happens. You’re always following me and stuck dealing with my schedules. I want to see you in your natural state.”

“You definitely have a lot more courage than I do,” Jihoon tells him, “Even if you don’t think so.”

“Me?” Soonyoung said in shock, “I usually don’t associate myself with that word.”

“Well, you are courageous. You stepped in and saved me, even when the issue had nothing to do with you. You confessed to liking Wonwoo, then soon after you confronted him about his affair with his friend. You survived losing your first crush. You’re also run after your dreams of dancing, even if you’re unsure and scared. Not to mention the times you’ve danced in front of a crowd. You don’t like to think of yourself in that light, but I see it. I notice.”

Soonyoung shook his head, even though he knew Jihoon couldn’t see, “More than half of those things were only possible because I had my friends around me. I couldn’t have done it without them.”

“It was still all you in the end,” Jihoon encountered, “It was all your choice in the end. They would have stood with you no matter what your choice was. Plus, they weren’t there to tell you to protect me, knowing Jun he would have told you to stay out of it. You can keep denying it, but I’m always going to remind you of all the things you’ve done.”

“There’s no way of stopping you, is there?” Soonyoung said, rubbing his forehead.

Jihoon chuckles, “When it comes to you, no, there is no stopping me. I’ve got nothing else to lose. I want you to know everything about me.”

“Have you decided then?” Soonyoung asked exasperated, “If I can follow you on one of your schedules?”

“I wouldn’t mind if you followed me around for the rest of my life,” Jihoon tells him, “But not tomorrow. Jisoo is going to be done with your guys dance video, and you’re going to want to be with Jun and Minghao. Plus, I have something going on already. The day after tomorrow, let’s hang out then. There’s somewhere I go, and I want to go there with you.”

There it was again, Soonyoung’s heart was racing from Jihoon’s words. Why did he have to be so straightforward with everything he said? Soonyoung couldn’t handle it. 

“Okay,” Soonyoung said as he curled up into a ball, “Text me the time and place tomorrow. It’s getting late now, so I’m going to try to get some sleep.”

“Okay,” Jihoon said, “I’ll text you tomorrow. Sleep well.”

“You- You too,” Soonyoung said before he hung up.

Throwing his phone to the side, Soonyoung sighed as he rubbed his cheeks. He couldn’t believe the conversation he just had. And it was with Jihoon! It was the most they’ve ever spoken with each other ever since they’ve meet.

Soonyoung had to admit, it wasn’t a bad feeling. As strange as Jihoon was at the beginning, and as hard as he was in the middle, he was interesting to figure out right now. 

He was about to roll over again, to get into a more comfortable sleeping position, when his phone went off telling him he had a new text message. Grabbing his phone back into his hand, Soonyoung turned on the screen and opened up his messages.

**Jihoon: I heard from someone, who heard from someone else, you listen to Woozi when you can’t fall asleep at night. I hope it helped you tonight.**

 

Soonyoung walked down the stairs, rubbing his sore eyes. He barely slept after receiving Jihoon’s text message last night. Soonyoung knew Jihoon was leaving behind a huge hint and it made him flustered. He was up all night, furious at Jihoon for keeping him up, and also mad that Jihoon had that effect on him. 

Jun had heard of the finished video, and he was coming over with Minghao. Once Soonyoung heard the doorbell, he had gone down to greet them. His parents were gone for their jobs, and Soonyoung had nothing huge planned other than to hang out with his friends.

“Why do you look like that, Hyung?” Minghao said as soon as Soonyoung opened the door for them.

“Wha-What?” Soonyoung said in a fluster, “What do you mean?”

“Did you sleep at all?” Jun frowned. “You have such bad dark circles around your eyes.”

“Was it because you talked with Jihoon last night?” Minghao said, walking in to take off his shoes, “Did you guys end up talking all night?”

“Jihoon?” Jun asked, following the actions of Minghao, “You were talking with Jihoon all last night? How come I’m just hearing of this?”

“It wasn’t all last night,” Soonyoung tells them with a groan, “I just couldn’t sleep well after.”

“Why?” Jun asked with concern, “Did he say something weird? Was everything Seungcheol said a lie, and Jihoon is a weirdo? Cause I wouldn’t be surprised. Don’t tell me he demanded weird things over the phone.”

“Juuunn,” Minghao whined, “Jihoon-hyung isn’t that strange. He wouldn’t demand anything like that.”

“He demanded you to give Soonyoung’s phone number to him,’ Jun retaliated. 

“If only you would listen to me when I tell you about him, you wouldn’t have such weird theories about him,” Minghao said.

Soonyoung had already closed the front door and was following his friends up to his bedroom. He wasn’t really ready to tell them everything just yet. He also really wanted to hear what Minghao knew about Jihoon.

“Why would I want to know about a guy who is torturing my best friend,” Jun retorts, shaking his head.

“You already know he’s not like that,” Minghao argues on, “He just really likes Soonyoung-hyung.”

Jun scoffs, “Well he has a weird way of showing it then. Even if he was forced into some of it. I still don’t trust him, no matter what has been said about him.”

“He’s your friend as well,” Minghao mumbled, knowing Jun was never going to listen to him.

“You’re right,” Jun said, nodding, apparently used to Minghao mumbling, “He does think I’m his friend, and as his friend, he is going to get lectured by me.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but sigh, sitting down by his computer, “Are you guys going to continue bickering about Jihoon, or are you guys going to get excited about our video being done?”

“Yes, I’m finished wasting time on Jihoon,” Jun said, crossing his arms, sitting down on the bed, “I want to see our video.”

“We can talk about Jihoon later,” Minghao tells them, “Let’s see the video.”

Rolling his eyes, Soonyoung turns to his screen and clicks on the file Jisoo had sent him early that morning. He had yet to watch it too, as he was waiting to watch it with his friends.

They watched as the clip shows up, scene flowed into another, and they appear in all different angles. As soon as they make their first move and the music comes on, Soonyoung’s jaw drops. There was something different about the track, it was new yet it still flowed with their dance. He was sure he told Jisoo which Woozi song it was. 

How was this possible? Did Jisoo know how to remix music too? And was it legal to remix someone’s song like this without their permission? 

The questions swam in his head, but he waited till the end to say it all. He didn’t want to ruin this moment for any of them. Despite the change in the music, the whole performance was still stunning. Jeonghan knew what he was doing when he filmed. He had only studied their choreography that day, yet he had perfected every angle to showcase all the highlights. And Jisoo knew which shot to take and edit them together effortlessly. It was amazing what they could do together.

“It’s perfect,” Jun said as soon as the screen went black.

“Is that how we really look when we’re dancing?” Minghao said in amazement.

“We have to call Jisoo,” Soonyoung said, turning to his friends, “The audio is not the original. I don’t know if we can upload this if we don’t have permission to remix the song.”

“Don’t people do it all the time, anyways?” Minghao said, shrugging, taking out his phone.

“We are not one of those people. We need to know if it is okay, otherwise we need to replace the audio with the original,” Soonyoung said urgently, leaning over to make sure Minghao was calling.

Minghao places the call and puts it on speaker. By the second ring Jisoo answers.

“What’s up, Minghao,” Jisoo greets him.

“Hyung,” Minghao starts out, “I’m with Jun and Soonyoung-hyung. Soonyoung-hyung wants to know why you remixed the song. He says we can’t upload it without permission.”

“Ahhh,” Jisoo calmly exclaims, “Don’t be too surprised, but I actually know who Woozi is, and he remixed the song for me. It’s fine if you guys upload it. He wants you guys to. He saw the video and loved it.”

Jun looks over at Soonyoung with wide eyes, then back down at Minghao’s phone, “Hyung, you know who Woozi is?”

“Yeah,” Jisoo said with a chuckle, “Don’t bother asking me who he is though, I don’t expose my friend’s secrets. Just know you guys are good. Upload the video already. Jeonghan and I want to see it live. We worked all night for it. And we know you guys have been working even longer to showcase your skills. Send me a link when it’s ready.”

Soonyoung couldn’t believe it. Woozi gave them permission to use a whole new remix. This amazing rendition of his song. He was speechless.

Once Minghao hangs up on Jisoo, they all look to one another.

“Woozi knows of us,” Jun tells them.

“Your dream and goal, Hyung,” Minghao urgently tells Soonyoung.

This was all too soon. Soonyoung was going to work for this recognition, yet Woozi gave it to him so easily. And Minghao was right, it was everything he ever wanted. He wanted to dance to one of Woozi’s new tracks, he wanted the praise of how great his dance was, he wanted to be noticed by his favorite youtuber. 

He couldn’t believe it. Grabbing his phone off his desk, Soonyoung started writing out a message.

“Soonyoung, couldn’t you wait till after the video was in the process of uploading to start texting people?” Jun said.

“Just wait,” Soonyoung tells his friends as he doesn’t take his eyes off his phone.

**Soonyoung: Did you get to see the video, before Jisoo sent it to me?**

It was only minutes later when he received a reply.

**Jihoon: I did. It was everything I expected and more. Hurry up and upload it! Don’t over think it too much and just do it already.**

With that, Soonyoung calmed down and went back to his computer. Opening up youtube, he created a new youtube account with his friends. Once they had that up and going, Soonyoung started processing the video.

While it processed, he wrote in the description to go with their video. He had to give credit to Jeonghan and Jisoo, and of course the biggest shoutout to Woozi. 

Another hour passed before the video was live. Getting the link, Soonyoung sent the link to all his friends who had been waiting. When he was done with that, the three friends wanted to watch the video one more time.

This time it would be through their official youtube account, Shining Diamonds.

 

Later that night, Soonyoung laid wide awake in bed. Other than the one time he had messaged Jihoon about their video, he hadn’t heard from him. How was he supposed to know what they were doing during the next day if Jihoon hadn’t told him anything.

Staring at his phone, he contemplated whether he should just go ahead and text Jihoon asking what was going on. Soonyoung didn’t want to seem eager about it though, so he went to a familiar youtube account to listen to music.

He was on the verge of sleep when his phone vibrated with a new text message. The first thing Soonyoung wanted to do was scream at Jihoon at how late it was. But he didn’t, cause he was curious as to what they were doing tomorrow. 

**Jihoon: The Eve, at 12pm.**

**Jihoon: Sorry it took me so long. I lost track of time.**

Soonyoung felt the familiar pulsing of his heart taking over. It was becoming so regular, Soonyoung didn’t even bother feeling confused over it. Instead, he let himself feel it for what it was. Jihoon had wormed his way into Soonyoung’s life, and now he was making his insides all tangled up with warmth and butterflies. 

 


	13. Your Secret Admirer 13

Soonyoung was up at a decent hour, he had nibbled at his breakfast, he chose his outfit, and he was a ball of wreck lying on his bed. He was going to be hanging out with Jihoon today, by choice, and they were going to be alone. How was this happening!?!

If Soonyoung didn’t know any better, this could have been seen as a date. Shaking his head furiously, Soonyoung held onto his upset tummy and told himself it wasn’t a date. They were just going to hang out and talk about their messed up past. All they were going to do was clear up a few misunderstandings, nothing else.

There was so much they had to talk about. Soonyoung didn’t even want to think about it all.

Already have looked into it, Soonyoung knew it took about 20 minutes to reach The Eve. He would have to be leaving soon, so he wouldn’t seem too early or too late. Standing up, he decided it was time to start walking. There was only one way to get through the day, and it was to actually start it first. Saying goodbye to his parents, Soonyoung leaves.

 

Reaching the place, Soonyoung didn’t see Jihoon yet. He wasn’t sure if he should go in and wait or stand outside and wait. Unsure of himself, Soonyoung decides to wait outside for a bit then go inside to wait.

Taking out his phone, Soonyoung placed his earphones in and clicked on youtube’s app. Out of habit, he watches Woozi’s videos to calm his nerves. Getting lost in video after video, he didn’t realize how much time passed.

Having his earphones in too, he doesn’t hear it when there are footsteps walking up to him. Only when there is a nudge to his back does he realize he isn’t alone anymore. With wide eyes, Soonyoung noticed the time. It was already 12:05. Pulling his earphones out, he puts them away in his pockets.

With a pounding heart, Soonyoung turns around to face the only person who would notice him. And when he sets eyes on Jihoon, Soonyoung couldn’t help but mirror the small smile Jihoon had on too.

“Jihoon,” Soonyoung said in greeting.

“Did you wait long?” Jihoon asks.

Soonyoung slightly shakes his head, “No. And if I did, I had the company of music.”

“Anybody interesting?” Jihoon asked, tilting his head in wonder.

With a shrug, Soonyoung said, “Just some random youtuber.”

With a small pout, Jihoon turned to walk to the front doors, “Are you ready to go in?”

Soonyoung smiled widely to himself. How did this always happen? He was a total mess when he was away from Jihoon, but the moment he was around the guy they got along just fine. 

“What is this place anyways?” Soonyoung asked as he followed Jihoon inside.

Jihoon tilts his head back, explaining, “It’s a cafe, but also a art studio. I come here to have a break away from all my major projects. It’s owned by the art teacher’s brother.”

“We’re drawing today?” Soonyoung asked with hesitation. He was bad at drawing, it wasn’t something he excelled at. 

“You can do any kind of art you want,” Jihoon tells him, leading them over to the front counter, “You order your drink and your canvas. Then there are a variety of tools you can borrow to do whatever you wish. It’s why I love the place, every time is something new.”

They take some time to choose what they want to drink. Then Jihoon helps Soonyoung figure what size canvas would be good for a first time artwork. Once they have everything ready, Jihoon leads them to a work area in the studio. Soonyoung follows with both their drinks.

As much as Soonyoung wanted to pay for his portion, Jihoon wouldn’t let him. They bickered a bit over it, but Soonyoung relented. There was just no winning over Jihoon.

After putting their drinks down, a flustered Soonyoung watches as Jihoon sets up both their canvas on a tripod easel. He knew he would be out of control, but this was something totally different. Soonyoung felt like his limbs, which are usually very talented, are just plain clumsy. If he touched anything, everything would fall apart. 

Glad to have Jihoon there, Soonyoung watched in awe as Jihoon walked around with confidence. 

“The easels are set,” Jihoon informs him, “Let’s go choose some colors.”

Not able to talk, Soonyoung just nods. Once again, he follows Jihoon over to the wall filled with containers. There were all sort of art supplies thinkable available for use. 

Again, Soonyoung took some time to decide which direction he wanted to take. He didn’t realize how much thought process it took to do all of this. 

“Does it usually take you a long time to decide what you what to do?” Soonyoung asked Jihoon. 

Jihoon, himself, was walking up and down the wall of supplies. “There are days when it takes a while for inspiration to come to me. Then there are days when I know exactly what I’m doing. Just know nothing you do here can be wrong. Art is just that, art. There is no wrong or right. Unless you really mess it up, then I can’t help you defend it.”

Hearing Jihoon say that, Soonyoung finally let himself pick up a palette. Choosing paint colors that stuck out to him, Soonyoung filled the palette with hues of blues and pinks. Going over to a row of paint brushes, he picks out a few too.

When he was satisfied with what he had chosen, Soonyoung looks over to what Jihoon had chosen. There was an array of colors Soonyoung had no idea what Jihoon could do with. Done taking a peek at Jihoon’s handful, he goes back to looking at all the colors. He doesn’t even notice when Jihoon walks over to him.

“You should probably add some white,” Jihoon tells him, “You never know when you will need to mix some different hues in.”

Widening his eyes, Soonyoung nods. Jihoon knew what he was talking about, so there was no arguing with him. Moving over to the white tube, he applies some to his palette as well. 

Going back to their work stations, Soonyoung places his paint brushes down and tries to picture what he wants to do. He knows Jihoon is staring at him and he tries to ignore the ever curious glare.

“There’s no time limit,” Jihoon said, “You can take as long as you like.”

“I know,” Soonyoung solemnly said back, “I’m just scared to mess it up.”

“We don’t have to show it to anyone. This will stay between you and me,” Jihoon said, walking over to Soonyoung, placing his hand lightly on Soonyoung’s hand, “Plus, anything you do is going to be amazing.”

Soonyoung didn’t believe his words, but he wanted to. Sighing, Soonyoung said, “I hope you’re right.”

“Just start, you never know what can happen,” Jihoon said with a small smile. “Let me know when you’re finished.”

Jihoon walks back to his easel, stretching out his shoulders and neck. Without any further words, he went to work.

Soonyoung looks away from Jihoon to his own canvas. Taking in a deep breath, he exhales. There was nothing else to do but to start. Picking up a brush, Soonyoung dips in it some pink, and with some decisive movement he makes the first stroke on his canvas. 

Half way through, Jihoon replaces Soonyoung’s empty drink.

“I got us another drink,” Jihoon simply said as he went back to his own spot.

Soonyoung gave a thankful smile and looked back to his painting.

 

He was done, and it actually didn’t look half as bad as he thought it was going to. Putting his brush and palette down, Soonyoung stretches out his stiff limbs.

His movements don’t go unnoticed by Jihoon. “Are you done?”

Soonyoung looks over to Jihoon and nods. “I am.”

Jihoon smiles and walks over. He stands next to Soonyoung and they both look at his painting. They’re both quiet for a long while.

“Why did you decide on this?” Jihoon quietly asks, still not looking away from the painting.

Soonyoung glances at Jihoon, telling him, “There was another painting like this. I remember seeing it at one of the school’s exhibits. It was really cool. Sometimes I can’t help but think of it. So when I was thinking of what I could do, that painting came to mind.”

Jihoon nods, “Yeah, that was something I painted. I thought you would have forgotten about it already.”

Confusion swims through Soonyoung’s mind as an invisible hand grasped at his heart and held it. The morning sky filled with pinks and blues, the painting that floated through his mind was something Jihoon painted it? They were so young back then, Soonyoung only remembers being stuck in one place for a long time, staring at the pretty colors and the way the strokes were done. It was only when Jun came back for him when he realized how long he actually had been standing there for.

“It was your painting?” Soonyoung asked, getting over his stunned speechlessness.

“I was standing a bit from you when you stopped in front of my painting,” Jihoon went on to explain, “No one else had stopped to even consider it. No one else said anything about it. It was so simple, but I loved that painting. Then you came by and you were so entranced. And when Jun came by, you told him how pretty you thought it was. He scoffed but you still stared as he pulled you away.”

Jihoon sighed before continuing his story, “My parents wanted me to take a different path, something they are both involved in. I wanted to paint. No one really believed in me, and I was kind of losing hope too. But you made me keep going. You made me believe in myself.”

Finally, Soonyoung understood, “And now you’re now the talk of the art department.”

Jihoon nodded, “My parents are fine with me pursuing art now, but I had to really work for it.”

 

The studio was going to keep their paintings for a day or two, to let them dry out. They had spent quite some time there, painting away. But it was really nice. Soonyoung didn’t mind how sore he felt. He had learnt so much that day, about art and about Jihoon.

Not wanting their day to finish so fast, Jihoon suggested they take a walk. Soonyoung smiled and agreed.

“Really though,” Jihoon said, walking beside Soonyoung, “Your guys video is doing really well for a first video.”

Soonyoung shrugged, rubbing his neck, “It was all the help of Woozi’s remixed song, really.”

“Have you read the comments though?” Jihoon countered, “They’re all about the choreography.”

“You read the comments?” Soonyoung looks over to Jihoon with a curiosity.

Jihoon looks away, but not before Soonyoung noticed a slight flush to his cheeks. “I wanted to watch it again in the morning. I can’t help it but to read the comments too.”

“It was all thanks to Jeonghan and Jisoo, really. They did an amazing job filming and editing,” Soonyoung continued, not commenting on a blushing Jihoon.

“They are amazing at what they do. Jun and Minghao were pretty great too,” Jihoon went on to say.

“Our friends are pretty cool. I don’t know what I would have done without them,” Soonyoung said, sighing.

Jihoon let out an exasperated breath, “You really don’t ever talk good about yourself do you?”

Soonyoung went quiet. Because there was a time when he did, and it was when he was crushing on some other boy. After his first heartbreak Soonyoung had lost a lot of his confidence.

“You promised,” Jihoon tells him, “We learn about each other from each other. No more hiding or lies. I want to know what is bothering you so much.”

Soonyoung’s hands were all twisted up together, “The last time I had any confidence, I was so sure I was head over heels in love with a guy who ended up loving someone else. The heartache, which you saw, broke me.”

Another set of hands claps themselves around Soonyoung’s, and they both stop walking. Jihoon separates the confused clustered fingers. Instead of letting go right away, he intertwines his in both of Soonyoung’s.

Jihoon stands in front of Soonyoung and looks up to him. “You know, I’m going to be here right beside you, every step of the way, while you heal that heart of yours. And even when you don’t believe in yourself, I’ll do it for you till you do again.”

Soonyoung’s heart thumped within his chest, it was telling him something. His heart wanted him to notice what was going on right in front of him. His face heated up at Jihoon’s words, and he was left speechless.

Even if he had amazing friends like Jun and Minghao, he knew there was no one around like Jihoon. 

Closing his eyes for a split second to calm his heart, Soonyoung opens them again to look at Jihoon’s caring eyes. All Soonyoung could do was nod at Jihoon.

It was all Jihoon needed, as he let go of one hand but held fast to the other. He pulls Soonyoung forward on their walk.

“Minghao knows about the painting. He saw a glimpse of my phone screen and asked about it. If he knows, then I’m sure Jun knows as well,” Jihoon tells him.

“You have the original as your phone screen?” Soonyoung asks.

“Yeah,” Jihoon said as he brought out his phone. Turning on the screen, he hands it to Soonyoung. Soonyoung holds it in his free hand and studies the painting from his past. 

“Just as pretty as the first time I saw it,” Soonyoung commented out loud.

Jihoon nods, “It was after that when I started noticing you. I couldn’t help it but learn everything about you.”

“You’ve noticed me for that long?” Soonyoung asks.

“Even if I wanted to stop thinking about you, you showed up in my dreams,” Jihoon said, “And when I really wanted to stop liking you, you would appear in front of me at school and all the feelings came back up. It was a never ending cycle. Seungcheol wanted to scream at you for making me into a fool. He knew it wouldn’t have helped, of course. I finally just let the emotions come as they wished, but then it got bad last year when I noticed you were happy for another whole new reason.”

“Why did you never tell me? Or just come up to me?”

Jihoon looks up at Soonyoung with a frown, “The same reason why it took you a whole year to tell Wonwoo. I was scared and afraid the feelings wouldn’t be returned. You had no idea who I really was.”

Soonyoung couldn’t say anything to that, he knew it was true. Who knows what would have happened if Jihoon wasn’t so persistent on staying in his life.

“But we’re here now,” Jihoon said with hope, “And we can continue slowly fixing everything that went wrong.”

A smile grows on Soonyoung’s lips as he said, “I would like that as well.”

 

Later that evening, Soonyoung was walking home when his feet led him to Jun’s home instead. Not thinking much about it, he lets himself in and waves a hello at Jun’s parents. Making his way up to Jun’s room, Soonyoung couldn’t stop feeling so light.

He hadn’t felt this light in such a long time. For the first time, in a long time, he felt hopeful about his future.

Soonyoung was so lost in thought, he didn’t realize he had opened up Jun’s door to Jun and Minghao making out on the bed.

“Ahhh!! What are you guys doing!?” Soonyoung screamed as he turned around.

“Hyung!” Minghao screamed as he pushed Jun away from him.

“That’s why the door was closed, and why you should knock,” Jun screamed at him in a whisper.

“Sorry,” Soonyoung said back in a whisper.

“Will you just get in here, Kwon Soonyoung, before my parents come up here with questions,” Jun continues to whisper.

Turning around, Soonyoung walks over to the desk and sits in the chair there. Jun and Minghao moves to sit in front of him.

“What’s up?” Jun finally asks in a normal voice.

“I kind of hung out with Jihoon today,” Soonyoung tells them.

Jun nods, “Minghao told me.”

Soonyoung slowly shook his head, he wasn’t even surprised anymore at how close Minghao and Jihoon were. “You guys know why he likes me so much.”

Jun grimaces and fumbles with his hands, “It wasn’t really something you should have heard from me. It was only right you heard from Jihoon.”

“How did it go, Hyung?” Minghao asks.

So Soonyoung tells them everything.

At the end of it, Jun carefully chooses his words, “How do you feel about everything? About Jihoon?”

Soonyoung sighs, quickly running a hand over his eyes, “I- I think I actually really like him.”


	14. Your Secret Admirer 14

Soonyoung was dancing away the stress in the practice room he always borrowed from a friend. It had been a long week, and he needed the flow of music, the structured movements, the sense of peace. He was also waiting for Jun and Minghao to show up, they were going to be filming their next video. And while waiting, he decided to get warmed up first. 

In the middle of a routine, he hears the door being opened. He doesn’t stop, but watches the door through the mirror, waiting for his friends to join him. It was their ritual, joining Soonyoung who was always first and already dancing. 

But it wasn’t Jun or Minghao who walked through the doors.

Jihoon walked in and closed the door behind him. Standing quietly by the door, he stared at Soonyoung. 

Seeing Jihoon, Soonyoung stops dancing and stares back at him through the mirror.

“Ji-Jihoon,” Soonyoung stumbles out, “What are you doing here?”

“I heard from Minghao you guys were having dance practice today,” Jihoon said with a slight glare.

Soonyoung frowned, he hadn’t seen that glare in while. He also know it was his own fault Jihoon was slightly angry. They’ve barely talked or seen each other since their first hang out alone. After admitting his feelings to his friends, Soonyoung was scared of seeing or talking to Jihoon.

Jihoon sighed and let the glare fall, taking small steps he walks towards Soonyoung. “You said we wouldn’t have to learn about each other through other people. But I have to find you through Minghao? What’s wrong Soonyoung?”

Soonyoung didn’t know how to respond. How could he tell Jihoon he was scared of feeling more than he already was. He was scared of everything and anything that had to do with Jihoon. Letting his guard down and opening his heart to someone like Jihoon made him scared.

With each small step Jihoon took, it lead him closer to Soonyoung. Once Jihoon was close enough, Soonyoung turned around to face him, but Jihoon didn’t stop his advance. He kept walking into Soonyoung’s personal space.

“Ji-Jihoon,” a flustered Soonyoung said, “What are you doing?”

Jihoon tilts his head up to Soonyoung and smirks, “The only thing I can think of in a situation like this.”

Soonyoung didn’t have the time to think, Jihoon was still walking forward. Not losing each other’s gaze, Soonyoung takes steps back. He was trying to keep the distance between them, but it was pointless as Jihoon only filled those spaces right back up, not willing to stay far from him.

Hitting the wall, Soonyoung knew he had nowhere else to go. He was stuck between a wall and Jihoon. Now he really didn’t have a choice but to face Jihoon head on.

Bringing up his arms, Jihoon cages Soonyoung in. 

With widened eyes, Soonyoung looks at both Jihoon’s arms before looking back at Jihoon. 

“Soonyoung-ah,” Jihoon said, still looking at the flustered Soonyoung, “What are you thinking about right now?”

Looking at Jihoon, Soonyoung pouts and blinks. Being this close to Jihoon, he could feel his heartbeat fastening. A heat rose up to his neck and cheeks, and he was sure he was turning red. He was sweating from exertion before, but now he was sweating from nervousness. 

“I’m sorry,” Soonyoung sputtered out.

Jihoon frowned, “Why are you sorry?”

“I-I was the one who wanted us to communicate more yet I was the one who pulled back right after. I’m sure I was sending a lot of mixed signals,” Soonyoung said while grimacing.

“I don’t care what kind of signals you are sending,” Jihoon said shaking his head, “All I care is that they are coming my way. No matter what is going on your mind, I want to know of them.”

Soonyoung sighs and stares at Jihoon. Their eyes connect and Soonyoung is reminded of everything that makes up Jihoon. The care Jihoon always carries for him, the memories that ties them together, the heartache and healing they’ve been through. Being this close to Jihoon, Soonyoung remembers that nothing really could keep them apart for long. Their past and present were tied together, and Jihoon was going to do everything in his power to keep their future that way as well. The determination in Jihoon’s eyes reminds him that everything would be okay, that they were okay.

Without asking if it was okay, because he knew it was, Soonyoung leans forward and places his forehead on Jihoon’s shoulder. If Jihoon was surprised, he didn’t show it. He kept his posture, keeping Soonyoung held up.

“What’s wrong, Soonyoung?” Jihoon asked with genuine worry now.

“I missed you,” Soonyoung tells him.

“Why didn’t you just call me then, you,” Jihoon said with a small chuckle.

“I wanted to,” Soonyoung said, frowning, “But I was scared. I am scared. Do you have any idea how scary it is to fall for someone as quickly as I did you?”

There is a moment of silence before Jihoon sighs and said, “Do you have any idea how scary it is to fall in love with someone who may or may not even know of your very existence? How scary it was to almost lose the love of your life to someone else? Every day is always the same fear, what if I am forgotten by the very person who makes my life easier to live?”

Hearing Jihoon’s confession, Soonyoung brings up his arms around Jihoon’s smaller frame. Wrapping them around Jihoon, he brings their body closer to each other. Jihoon’s own hands leave the wall and returns the hug.

They hear the door opening and closing, but it doesn’t register that it means they aren’t alone anymore till they are interrupted by a cough.

Soonyoung hears the loud cough and lifts his head up towards the door. Jun and Minghao are standing there, staring at them with confusion and shock. Seeing his friends, Soonyoung becomes even more flushed.

“Ju-Jun, Minghao,” Soonyoung said in a rush, leaving the embrace of Jihoon. “Jihoon dropped by to say hi.”

Jihoon turns around to face Jun and Minghao, waving. “Hey.”

Minghao awkwardly waves back, “Jihoon-hyung did mention he wanted to come by for one of our dance practices.”

“Are we still going to film today?” Jun asked, looking from Jihoon to Soonyoung.

With the mention of film, Soonyoung remembers the reason why they were there in the first place. “Ah, yes, we’re still filming. We’ll practice a few times, then film a few, and chose the one we like best.”

 

Despite the film just having the three of them in it, Jihoon stayed to overwatch everything, giving advice to them on what could have been better for angle. After a few hours, they were satisfied with what they had gotten.

Soonyoung wanted to stay longer, to come up with new ideas for new songs, but he also knew Jihoon was waiting for him. And he knew Jihoon would have been willing to wait, but he didn’t want to make Jihoon wait. Packing up his belongings for the day, he gathers everyone together.

“I’ll be uploading the video tonight,” Soonyoung tells Jun and Minghao.

Jun nods, “Okay. Did you want to go over anything else today? It’s still pretty early. Unless you have something else to do...” Jun looks over to Jihoon.

Minghao pulls at Jun’s hand, “Come on Jun. If Soonyoung is letting us have the evening off, let’s go get the ice cream you promised me.”

“You too?” Jun asked, looking over to Minghao, “Usually you want to stay late to come up with new choreography too.”

Minghao faces Jun and pouts, “Today I want ice cream.”

Soonyoung smiles and said, “You guys can go get ice cream. We’ll start a new song next time. We still have to film all our other choreographies too later. This is enough for the day.”

“Are you sure?” Jihoon said, looking at Soonyoung with a frown, “It doesn’t bother me if you guys have to do more here.”

“Next time,” Soonyoung tells him, “We have an unfinished conversation.”

“See,” Minghao said to the group, “Everyone deserves a break. You guys go and talk, while Jun treats me to ice cream.”

“How is that a break for me?” Jun playfully argues.

Minghao blinks before saying, “You like to see me eating.”

Jun becomes quiet at that.

It was decided.

 

Soonyoung and Jihoon found themselves walking along the Han River. At first, they walked next together in a peaceful silence, just enjoying each other’s company. Then Jihoon slid his hand into Soonyoung’s, and Soonyoung looked down only to hold onto Jihoon’s tighter.

“You guys were amazing back there,” Jihoon said, smiling to himself.

“I actually have something to tell you about my dancing,” Soonyoung said, also smiling to himself.

Jihoon looks up and smiles even wider, “What is it?”

“I know what I want to do with my future now,” Soonyoung said, smiling towards Jihoon, “and part of it was all thanks to you.”

“Tell me,” Jihoon said, holding onto Soonyoung’s hand even tighter in anticipation. 

“It’s a little crazy, but I want to open up my own dancing studio. So I can teach others who want to learn to dance as well,” Soonyoung tells Jihoon with a wide smile, “It’s a little tough right now, since I don’t have my own dance studio, but I’m working on it. Once school is done, and after I start college, I hope to have it up and running. It’s a little crazy to try juggling it all, but it’s my passion, and I want to have it all.”

Jihoon chuckles, swinging their arm, “It sounds like you’ve thought of it all. How did I help you in any of that?”

Soonyoung looks over to Jihoon and his smile reaches his eyes, “My inspiration, my determination, my motivator. It was all you.”

Jihoon pulls at Soonyoung’s hand, making them bump into each other. “Even if I motivate you, you still put in all the hard work.”

“Ahhh, that reminds me,” Soonyoung said, his smile falling a little, “I-I got a job.”

“A job?” Jihoon asked, his smile disappearing too.

“For the dance studio,” Soonyoung said, nodding, “My parents would never approve of it. They expect me to get some company job, something that I can work 9 to 5, and still get the weekends off. They want me to have a normal stable life. And I get it, I do, the stable life. But I want more than that. I want to live the way I want to live. For my own happiness.”

Intertwining their fingers, Jihoon squeezes Soonyoung’s hand, “I understand, and I agree. For your happiness, because I want you to happy. But let’s tweak it a little bit.”

Soonyoung glances at Jihoon and asks, “Tweak it?”

Jihoon nods, “Let’s buy a building. Where you can have your dance studio, and where I can have my art studio. All in one building, somewhere I won’t have to run around to find you. Where I can just walk one floor down and I know you will be there. Where you can come find me if you become mad at your students and need to see me or want a hug. Somewhere we’re happy together.”

Stopping them in their tracks, Soonyoung faces Jihoon, “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“For our happiness, I am very serious,” Jihoon tells him. “I need a studio so I can paint, I can’t continue doing it in my bedroom. And I am very serious about us.”

“Us?” Soonyoung wondered out loud, he had almost forgotten.

“Yes, us,” Jihoon said as he pulled Soonyoung along on their walk, “This is our second date. And very soon here, I am going to ask you something you cannot refuse.”

“Wha-What are you...?” Soonyoung stumbled out.

“Would you like to be my boyfriend, Kwon Soonyoung?” Jihoon asked, looking Soonyoung in the eye.

Soonyoung looks back, confused. “Second date? Boyfriend?”

Jihoon laughs, “You’re so cute. Of course, I want you to be my boyfriend. That one should have been obvious. And yes, we’re on our second date. So what do you say?”

They stayed that way for a second and it almost seemed to blur into minutes. Soonyoung was too stunned at how easy everything was. He couldn’t believe it was actually happening.

“You still haven’t answered me,” Jihoon said, swinging Soonyoung’s arm.

Soonyoung could feel the thumping of his heart against his chest. His heart was trying to reach out to Jihoon, to tell him what Soonyoung couldn’t.

While they walked, Soonyoung pulled Jihoon’s hand up and placed it over his heart.

“What is it telling you?” Soonyoung whispered loud enough for Jihoon to hear.

“Your heart?” Jihoon whispered back, “It’s telling me... It’s telling me yes.”

Jihoon looks up to Soonyoung to confirm it.

Soonyoung returns the look and nods, “Yes.”

A smile grows on Jihoon’s lips and Soonyoung returns it with his own smile. It felt good, to not be scared of hiding from Jihoon. 

“You’re responsible for me now,” Jihoon tells him, “Not that you haven’t already been. But you better be careful. Cause as you know, Seungcheol is still going to be around, and now I really can’t protect you from him anymore.”

Soonyoung looks at him with worry, “Wouldn’t Seungcheol be happy?”

Jihoon begins laughing, holding onto his stomach with his free hand, “You really do know Seungcheol, huh? He’s been wanting to know what’s been going on.” Jihoon stops laughing and continues, “Seriously though, you might want to be careful still, who knows what he is thinking at times.”

Swinging Jihoon’s arm, Soonyoung nods with a smile, “Of course. I want us to be happy. And we will be.”

“Does that mean you want our building to happen?”

Soonyoung’s smile grows wider, “I do.”

 

The next few weeks go by in a blur. Soonyoung works. Jihoon paints. Soonyoung, Jun, and Minghao film, and put out more of their dance videos. Jihoon watches Soonyoung come up with more new choreography. Soonyoung forces Jihoon out on dates. Jihoon teaches Soonyoung about art. Soonyoung shows off a very intimate dance that leaves Jihoon open mouth speechless. Things are good, if not amazing.

Then one day, Jihoon asks Soonyoung over to his house. 

“Did you want to come over to my house?” Jihoon asked over the phone.

Soonyoung stays quiet, unsure of what to say. It seemed too quick, going over to each other’s houses, and what if Jihoon’s parents were over?

“W-Why?” Soonyoung asked, still flustered, “Did you want to show me some of your paintings?”

“It’s a secret,” Jihon tells him.


	15. Your Secret Admirer 15

Soonyoung stands in front of Jihoon’s apartment building and stares at the towering form. Pulling his phone out of his pants pocket, Soonyoung calls Jihoon.

“Jihoonie,” Soonyoung says as Jihoon answers the call.

“Are you here?” Jihoon asks.

Soonyoung nods even though he knows Jihoon can’t see, “Outside your building.”

“Okay, I’ll come get you,” Jihoon tells him, “Don’t move.”

“But what if I have an itch?” Soonyoung playfully whines.

Jihoon laughs, “I’ll come and scratch it for you.”

“Hurry up then!”

When Jihoon shows up, Soonyoung is looking at the view around the building. Jihoon takes the chance of Soonyoung being distracted to tickle him, in the act of scratching his itch for him.

Soonyoung jumps at the touch and turns around to find a grinning Jihoon. He laughs at Jihoon’s playfulness, not even mad about the tickling. “Was that supposed to be scratching an itch?”

Jihoon smiles even wider and nods, “Did it help?”

Soonyoung nodded his head, crinkling his face up, “It did, thanks.”

“I’m glad I could help,” Jihoon replies.

They stare at each other for a moment, as if they haven’t seen each other in the longest of time. Soonyoung doesn’t mind though, he enjoys seeing Jihoon happy. Taking Jihoon’s hand in his own, he pulls Jihoon closer to him and gives him a small hug.

When they pull apart, Jihoon leads Soonyoung into his apartment building. Soonyoung stayed quiet, not sure why Jihoon had invited him over. They enter the building, use the elevator to reach Jihoon’s floor, and Jihoon uses a passcode to get into his place.

All the while, Soonyoung just takes it all in. It was interesting to see the place Jihoon returned to every night after they hung out all day. It was going to be more interesting to see the places Jihoon did his art, ate his food, and even slept.

Once in the apartment, Jihoon doesn’t stop to show Soonyoung anything. He leads Soonyoung right into one of the rooms that has it’s doors opened already. Before Soonyoung could really study the room or ask what was going on, Jihoon gestures at a chair for him to sit in.

Soonyoung finally glances around and notices a music studio. Seeing it all made Soonyoung’s heart pulse irregularly. What was Jihoon planning on doing?

“Jihoon,” Soonyoung said glancing up at the standing Jihoon in front of him.

Jihoon doesn’t explain the room though, instead he tells Soonyoung something else, “Open up your youtube app.”

Despite all the confusion, Soonyoung does as Jihoon asked. Pulling out his phone, he enters the familiar app. And right at the top is a new video from Woozi. Seeing the new video, Soonyoung looks up at Jihoon and back down at the video.

“Go ahead,’ Jihoon said, also glancing down at Soonyoung’s phone, “Watch the video.”

With a little nod, Soonyoung presses on the video, making the screen blow up with the video. Soonyoung turns up the volume and watches in silence. Woozi hadn’t uploaded anything in awhile, and this was bound to be a very unexpected performance.

Like usual, Woozi is wearing a mask. Also, like usual, Woozi didn’t converse, jumping right into the music. Soonyoung, like usual, loves every moment of hearing a new song from Woozi.

But something different happens this time around. Half way through the song, Woozi turns around in his seat and reaches up to take off his mask. 

Soonyoung gasps, glancing up at Jihoon before going back to his phone screen. Woozi was going to reveal himself. As the song continued, Woozi turns around and smiles at the screen. Looking back at him, through the tiny screen, was no other than his Lee Jihoon. Still not saying anything to whoever was watching, Woozi continues to finish his song.

When the song was done, and the music had faded away, Woozi continued smiling. “And now you know.”

The screen pauses itself, signalling the end of the video. Soonyoung couldn’t believe it. It really felt like there were no more secrets between them.

Noticing the video was done, Jihoon said, “What do you think?”

Soonyoung exits the app, turns off his phone, and stands up next to Jihoon. Smiling, he said, “My Lee Jihoon has always had a nice voice.”

“You knew,” Jihoon said, rubbing the side of his neck.

“You know I knew,” Soonyoung smirked, “You sang while we were in the school’s nursery room. I know you knew I heard, but I didn’t say anything.”

Jihoon sighed, “Yeah, I suspected it was then, when you figured it out.”

Soonyoung takes Jihoon’s hands in his, bouncing them between them, “Thank you for wanting to be with me when I watched the video. But why did you reveal yourself?”

A smile grows on Jihoon’s lips, “There wasn’t a reason for me to stay hidden anymore. I only made music for you to listen to, and now I don’t have to do it under a mask anymore.”

“Why are you so talented,” Soonyoung whines with a pout.

A laugh erupts from Jihoon, “I have to give credit to my parents. My dad is a composer, and my mom is a vocal trainer. They wanted me to go into the music industry with them when they found out I had a talent for music.”

“But you wanted art,” Soonyoung said, smiling.

“Whether it be with music or painting, it’s still all art to me,” Jihoon tells him, “I won’t be able to give up music so easily. I’m still going to have my art studio, but I’m going to be making music on the side as well.”

“If it makes you happy, then I’m happy,” Soonyoung said, leaning over to place his forehead on Jihoon’s.

“Good, cause I’m happy if you’re happy too,” Jihoon replies, moving forward to place a small kiss on Soonyoung’s lips.

After the sudden attack, Jihoon moves back from Soonyoung and laughs. Soonyoung is staring at him with a reddening face. 

“Wha-what was that for?” Soonyoung asks, touching his bottom lip.

“I wanted to kiss my boyfriend,” Jihoon said through giggles.

Soonyoung couldn’t respond, too shocked from the kiss. He contemplated between playing it cool or pulling Jihoon in for another kiss. 

Before he could act on any of those thoughts, Jihoon reaches his hand out to Soonyoung.

“Come on,” Jihoon said, “I want to show you my bedroom.”

Soonyoung looked at Jihoon’s hand to his face, “Your bedroom?”

Jihoon grinned, “All my masks are stored there, I want to show them to you.”

“Ahh,” Soonyoung said nodding his head, “Okay.”

“That is,” Jihoon continued with a smirk, “unless you were expecting something else.”

Hearing this, Soonyoung furiously shakes his head, “No, no. I want to see the masks.”

Jihoon laughs again, clearly having fun messing around with Soonyoung. “I won’t do anything to you, Soonyoung.”

“I know,” Soonyoung said, placing his hand in Jihoon’s, “I trust you.”

 

After much asking, from Chan’s side, the group of friends were going to hang out together. The last time it happened was when they were filming their first dance video. Chan had been dying to see his dancing hyungs again.

For Chan purposes, they decided to meet at their dance practice room. This way, the three dancers could still practice too. And when they saw the opportunity, they took it. Jeonghan wanted to film their practice, saying their new fans would love to see what happened behind the scenes and could possibly become interested in learning from them too. Jisoo happily volunteered to edit the video, saying he needed the practice.

Before anyone would be showing up, Soonyoung and Jihoon had arrived early. Soonyoung wanted to start his warm-ups and Jihoon had come prepared with a sketchbook and a bag full of pencils. Music was playing as Soonyoung concentrated on his movements, meanwhile, Jihoon bobbed his head to the beat and hummed as he drew.

The door opens and the first they hear is, “Woozi!!”

Soonyoung stops in his step and freezes up. Looking to the door, he sees a wide-eyed smiling Chan who only had eyes for Jihoon. Behind Chan, Soonyoung sees Jeonghan and Jisoo, both of them shaking their head with a smile.

Glancing over at Jihoon, Soonyoung sees him with his own small smile on.

“He’s been bugging me the moment he saw the video,” Jeonghan said with a small dramatic sigh.

Chan side eyed Jeonghan and glared, “How could you keep such a secret from me, Hyung? You know how much I love Woozi’s music, and how much I like Jihoon. I wouldn’t have told anyone.”

“It was Jihoon’s secret, meaning it was Jihoon’s right to let who he wanted to know know,” Jeonghan countered, “Don’t be getting uselessly mad at me.”

With a pout, Chan turned to Jisoo, “I’m guessing you feel the same?”

Jisoo chuckled and nodded, “Jeonghan is right. Jihoon should have been the one to tell you.”

Jihoon puts his things down and walks over to his group of friends, “Sorry Channie, it’s not that I didn’t trust you. I just didn’t want many people knowing till it was the right time. It was a secret identity for a reason.”

“Why is it the right time?” Chan asked with seriousness.

Jeonghan and Jisoo turns to Soonyoung. And Soonyoung, in turn, looks back and forth between them with confusion.

“Why are you guys looking at me?” Soonyoung asked.

“Why ARE you guys looking at him?” Chan asked too.

“Because,” Seungcheol said, walking into the room, “it’s all thanks to Soonyoung we even got Jihoon to sing. Even with the disguise of Woozi, Jihoon didn’t want to touch anything that dealt with music.”

Now it was Soonyoung’s turn to be really confused. He turns to Jihoon with a frown, “What does he mean?”

“Seungcheol,” Jihoon said with sigh, shaking his head.

“What?” Seungcheol said, wide-eyed, not sure what he had done wrong, “I thought by now you would have told him.”

Without a word, Jihoon walks over to Soonyoung, intertwines their hands, and starts for the door. 

Soonyoung, though very confused by Seungcheol’s words, follows Jihoon out the room. He wanted to know, and he knew they had to have a private conversation about it. 

Once they were outside the building, Jihoon stood in front of Soonyoung. Soonyoung looked down at a gloomy Jihoon and pulled him into a hug.

“You know you really don’t have to tell me if you aren’t ready yet,” Soonyoung said into the side of Jihoon’s head.

“I do want to tell you,” Jihoon said, breathing into Soonyoung’s neck, “And I wanted it to be at my own time, but that Choi Seungcheol, I’m going to have to talk to him later.”

“I’ll do it for you,” Soonyoung moves back an inch to take a peek at Jihoon, “I’ll tell him to stop making my Jihoonie angry.”

Jihoon started to laugh, “Thank you, Soonyoung. But I’ll deal with Seungcheol. You already have enough on your plate. I don’t want to stress you out anymore than necessary. I want you to be happy.”

“I am happy,” Soonyoung said, getting close to Jihoon again, “Nothing about you and me would ever stress me out. I’m the most happiest when I’m with you.”

Someone clearing their throat catches their attention. They both turn to the sound and see Jun and Minghao walking over to them. Jun is glaring at them while Minghao is grinning.

“You guys are so cute,” Minghao tells them.

Jihoon laughs again, pulling away from Soonyoung, “I know we are.”

“Out in broad daylight?” Jun scolds.

“Minghao, I think Jun is trying to tell you something,” Jihoon said, grinning.

“What?” Minghao asked in confusion. “He didn’t say anything to me.”

“He may have been talking to us,” Jihoon continued to explain, “but he was really saying how he would like more skinship from you. Whenever and wherever.”

Minghao turns to Jun with curious wide eyes, “Is that what you were saying?”

Jun shakes his head while sighing, “Nevermind, don’t listen to them. Let’s all go inside. We need to start practice.”

“We should start our practice,” Minghao said, looking at them with worry.

“We will,” Soonyoung tells his friends, “You guys go in first. Everyone else is there already. I just have one last thing to say to Jihoon.”

“Okay,” Jun replied, “Don’t take too long. Otherwise Chan is going to worry.”

Once Jun and Minghao enters the building, Soonyoung turns to look at Jihoon.

“Let’s stay after to finish our talk,” Soonyoung tells him.

Jihoon looks him in the eye and nods, “Okay. After practice, we’ll talk.”

  
  



	16. Your Secret Admirer 16

Chan watches their dance practice with wide eyes and Jeonghan has to remind him to blink a few times. Soonyoung almost wanted to make Chan choose between him and Woozi, he wanted to see who he favored the most. But he knew how upsetting it would have been for Chan, considering how he felt towards both of them.

Towards the end of the practice, Seungcheol stands up and said, “This was fun and all, but I have places to be.”

Jihoon looks over to Seungcheol and smirked, “You’ve been having a lot of places you need to be. Are you finally talking to her?”

Seungcheol smiles towards Jihoon, “We’ll have to talk later about it.”

“You better call me,” Jihoon tells him, “We have a lot to talk about.”

“I’m sure we do,” Seungcheol said, ruffling his own hair, “I’m probably going to be scolded by you. At least it’ll be over the phone.”

“Yeah,” Jihoon said, nodding, “I’m going easy on you, you should be glad.”

Seungcheol playfully sticks his tongue out at Jihoon before running out of the room.

“That guy is such a big kid,” Jihoon said, more to himself than anyone else, shaking his head.

“Aw,” Jeonghan said, clinging onto Jisoo, “He’s so cute when he’s in love though.”

Jisoo grins, “Since our Jihoonie is happy now, we should probably make sure Seungcheol is doing okay too.”

Jeonghan nods, “We’ll have to make sure they are good to each other.”

Turning to Jihoon, Jisoo says, “We’ll be going too then. Chan needs to be home, we promised his parents. And I want to get started on the videos Jeonghan got.”

Hearing this, everyone walks over to say bye.

“Thank you again,” Jun said, holding onto Jisoo’s shoulder, “Seriously, you’re really talented in what you do.”

“It’s all Jeonghan though,” Jisoo tells him.

Jeonghan wraps his arms around Jisoo’s middle, “You make my work shine though.”

“Can’t we stay longer?” Chan asked with a frown, “It’s not even that late.”

“It’s already 8pm,” Jeonghan turns to Chan, “Your mom wants you home, and you don’t want us on her bad side. We wouldn’t be able to see you again.”

“But,” Chan dragged out, “she knows I’m with you guys.”

Minghao has a small smile on his lips, “We’re all about to leave anyways, it is getting late.”

“Yeah,” Jihoon said, “It is getting late. You all need to leave.”

Jeonghan, still clinging onto Jisoo, pouts, “Jihoonie is throwing us out.”

“I am,” Jihoon said with a nod, “Soonyoung and I need to talk, and we can’t do that with all of you people here.”

Jun studies them with squinted eyes, “You guys sure you’re only going to talk?”

Jisoo lets out a chuckle, “What is that supposed to mean?”

Soonyoung, who had been listening to all of them, all this time, flushes red. He looks at Jun, his best friend, and said, “That’s all we’re doing. Talking, nothing more.”

“You better call me later too, then,” Jun tells him.

“Wha- why?” Soonyoung asks.

Jun frowns, tilting his head slightly, “We haven’t talked alone in a while. I like Minghao and Jihoon, but I miss it when it was just us. Plus, I have some stuff I want to talk to you too.”

Soonyoung pouts, feeling bad he’s been neglecting his best friend. He walks over to Jun and hugs him long and tight. Once he felt like he had pushed all the unsaid feelings into Jun, Soonyoung pulls back and smiles. “I’ll call you as soon as I get home.”

Jun smiles back and nod. 

Minghao walks over and takes Jun’s hand. “Come on Jun. We have to get me home.”

 

Once everyone had left the room, Soonyoung couldn’t help but feel slightly nervous. He didn’t want to be, considering he wanted to know what made Jihoon get into music, but it seemed to be very important when Jihoon did decide to do it. 

Jihoon was sitting down on the floor, gathering all his art supplies he had used that day. He didn’t pay Soonyoung any attention. 

All the while, Soonyoung was lingering around, messing with dance movements he had yet to decide if they were worth using. Having already packed his small belongings he brought to the practice room, he waited on Jihoon.

Soonyoung’s train of thought, filled with dance, was interrupted when he hears his own name. He looks over to Jihoon.

“Come sit down,” Jihoon said, patting an empty area next to him.

He blinked, a little unsure of if the wanted the conversation to start. But he knew he had to go over, there was nothing to be afraid of when it came to Jihoon. Finally, with a small nod, Soonyoung makes his way over to Jihoon and sits down on the floor with him.

Jihoon moves to sit right in front of Soonyoung. Looking at Soonyoung with kind caring eyes, a small smile growing.

Soonyoung smiles back, fumbling around with his fingers. They’re interrupted when his fingers are pulled apart by Jihoon, his heart pulses loudly, and they become intertwined with Jihoon’s. 

“You hold my hand a lot,” Soonyoung said, in observation.

Jihoon’s face turns blank, “Should we not hold hands then?” He started to pull their hands apart.

“No,” Soonyoung objected, holding on tighter to Jihoon’s fingers, “Don’t.”

With a smile back on his lips, Jihoon tightens their hold together too.

They’re quiet for a few minutes, just enjoying themselves, being together this close.

“So,” Jihoon said, breaking the silence, “Do you want to hear about it?”

“I do,” Soonyoung said quietly enough for Jihoon to hear.

Jihoon nods, “You know how my parents wanted me to get into music. So growing up it was all they ever trained me in, it was all I ever knew. At first I loved it, it was something I excelled at, but then it started to be a strain. My parents wanted me practicing it daily, learning instruments, learning how to compose, writing lyrics. It was all starting to be so much. I was just a child.”

Hearing Jihoon’s story, Soonyoung started rubbing small circles on Jihoon’s hand with his thumb. How could the confident boy sitting in front of him have so much trauma from his past?

After taking a small deep breath, Jihoon continued with his story. “After a point, I was just done. I didn’t want anything to do with music. Those were some dark days. I was constantly arguing with my parents, failing at music on purpose, and outright denying what they had called a god-given talent.”

At this, Soonyoung started to notice Jihoon’s shaking legs. Seeing him so unraveled and shattered, Soonyoung let go of their hold and without thinking started to rub Jihoon’s knees.

“If you want, you can take a break from talking about it,” Soonyoung said quietly, unsure of what else he could do for Jihoon.

Jihoon shook his head, “I want you to know. Because not only were they dark days, but I had a lot of dark thoughts. Seungcheol kept me alive enough for me to get through the days. I don’t know what would have happened to me if he wasn’t around. He talked me into taking different classes to try out new things, and I decided on a art class. At first I sucked, I didn’t know anything about how to draw. Nothing I did was worth mentioning.”

After noticing Jihoon calm down, Soonyoung went back to holding onto Jihoon’s hand.

“There were many days when I considered going back to doing music, something I was good at. But I knew I would have hated myself everyday doing something I didn’t enjoy. So I kept going, kept drawing, kept painting, kept learning everything about art. And like every year, there was an upcoming art show. Everyone was to do one piece, and I thought long and hard about it before I ended up going with painting the morning when I decided to change my whole life.”

Soonyoung felt his heart thump loudly, “The one I saw?”

Jihoon nodded with a small smile, “The one you saw and were so entranced with. Everyone around me had already started to tell me how good I had gotten, but I didn’t quite believe them. Seungcheol knew of my past, and Jeonghan and Jisoo figured out I had it hard. I felt like whatever they were saying was just to pacify me. All their kind words were out of pity. I know how wrong it was of me to think of it like this, but I was still struggling.”

“So when you came along and stood staring at my picture, you confused me to no end. Did you like it, did you hate it? I was so tempted to come up to you and to shove you away from my painting. But then Jun came around and you claimed my painting to be pretty.”

With a smile on his face, Soonyoung said, “It was. The most beautiful morning sky, a sky I wouldn’t mind waking up to everyday. That’s what I was actually thinking when I was staring at it.”

“If you want, I can paint a bigger scale of it in your dance studio,” Jihoon said, looking at Soonyoung with curiosity.

Before he could say anything, Soonyoung started to furiously nod his head.

Jihoon chuckled, “Okay, okay. Stop, before you lose your head.”

Soonyoung scoots closer to Jihoon as he stops nodding, “I would love anything you paint in our dance studio.”

“I like the sound of that,” Jihoon said with a growing smile, “Our studio.”

“Cause it will be ours,” Soonyoung said in confirmation, “Us together.”

They smiled at each other in the moment of silence, then Soonyoung couldn’t help it. He wanted to hug Jihoon, so that’s what he did, letting go of Jihoon’s hand he leans over to wrap him up in a hug.

“What’s this for?” Jihoon muffled out.

“I just wanted to,” Soonyoung tells him, “Plus, I wanted to say thank you for making it this far, for meeting me, and for never giving up. Thank you.”

Soonyoung’s heart and mind was swelling up with so many emotions for the boy in his arms. As crazy as everything had been leading up to this point in their lives, they were meant to have met each other and be in each other’s lives. Soonyoung wanted to believe this, knowing he wouldn’t have been any happier if he didn’t have Jihoon around.

Pulling away from Jihoon, Soonyoung asked, “Why did you go back to making music?”

Jihoon shrugged, “I found out you like to dance. I thought if you weren’t going to notice me for my art again, you might notice me for my music. I wanted to give you songs to dance to. For selfish reasons, I wanted to be part of your life no matter how small it was. But I didn’t want my parents knowing, so I made up Woozi and wore masks.”

“Even then, when I wanted to make you music, I was scared of falling back into my old self. I was scared I was going to give up art and continue with music when I knew it was going to be easier. So that’s why I painted my masks.”

Pulling Jihoon to him, Soonyoung wanted to hold onto Jihoon and never let go. 

Jihoon gasped at the movement, now almost sitting in Soonyoung’s lap. “Soonyoung.”

Soonyoung nuzzled into Jihoon’s neck, “You’ve done so much for me, even when I didn’t know you yet. I feel like I don’t deserve all this attention from you at all.”

Jihoon loosened Soonyoung’s hold far enough to look at Soonyoung, “It’s not about what we deserve, silly. It’s about our happiness. And we make each other happy. Don’t I make you happy, or do I have to keep trying?”

Soonyoung shook his head, tightening his hold on Jihoon’s waist, “You’re good the way you are. Don’t change anymore for me. I’m happy with you”

“You know I would run around the world twice for you, right?” Jihoon said, grinning.

“Don’t you dare,” Soonyoung pouted, “You have to stay beside me at all times.”

“Ahhh,” Jihoon nodded, “That sounds good too.”

“Yeah,” Soonyoung said, snuggling into Jihoon.

“Soonyoung-ah,” Jihoon said with a chuckle, “It’s not that I don’t mind, but do you think you’re ever going to let me go?”

“No,” Soonyoung tells him, rubbing his face into Jihoon.

Jihoon couldn’t help but laugh, especially when Soonyoung starts tickling him.

 

**Jun: Are you home yet?**

Soonyoung gasps as he realized he was supposed to have called Jun when he arrived home. He was still very overcome with happiness after his talk with Jihoon. Soonyoung had literally spent half an hour laying in bed giggling about their whole conversation. Then he wanted to go and rewatch Woozi. It was in the middle of watching a video when he received Jun’s text.

Exiting out of Youtube, Soonyoung called Jun right away.

“Jun,” Soonyoung said as soon as his friend picked up.

Jun could be heard sighing before saying, “Finally. How was your talk with Jihoon?”

Soonyoung smiled at the mention of Jihoon, “Good. Everything is pretty much explained now.”

“That’s good to hear,” Jun tells him.

“Yeah,” Soonyoung replied, “Everything in life is pretty good right now.”

“You know I’m super glad for you right?” Jun said.

“Thank you, Junnie,” Soonyoung said, holding in his giggles.

“There is something I wanted to tell you though,” Jun continued, more serious now.

Soonyoung coughed away the giggles and become more serious too, “Wha-what is it?”

Jun tells him, “Minghao and I have been talking a lot about our future. And I know we should have this conversation face to face, but you were busy with Jihoon. So I just wanted to let you know so you could think about it. We, Minghao and I, we want to join you at your dance studio. If you want us there.”

Without even having to think about it, Soonyoung blurted out, “Yes!”

He had so many daydreams of the three of them teaching people to dance. They would stay up way too late, making dance routines, laughing together, just being happy as they always were. Soonyoung wouldn’t of had it any other way.

Jun scoffs at the fast reply, “Good. Now you don’t have to work so much. Minghao and I will help buy the building too. You need to concentrate in school to get into a good college.”

“Are you sure?” Soonyoung asked with furrowed brows, “I don’t want you guys to worry about losing money that way.”

“Soonyoung-ah,” Jun scolded, “Will you stop already. We want to do this with you. If we’re going to do it, we’ve already decided to go all in. We don’t mind Jihoon taking the top floor, we honestly like Jihoon around. You’re our best friend, we want to be happy with you.”

Soonyoung smiles, “Okay. This is going to be so great. You, Minghao, me, Jihoon, and all his clinging friends. I can’t wait.”

Jun laughs, “I can’t wait too.”

 

Time flies when Soonyoung is busy everyday. Jihoon has to remind him to relax and do nothing. But even that doesn’t last long when Soonyoung is antsy with ideas running around his mind. He rather be at the dance studio dancing away or planning on filming another video.

In a flash of an eye, school was already going to begin for the year. With Jihoon, and his friends alongside him, Soonyoung was ready for the next couple of months. They were going to enjoy every last moment in their youthful high school days, working up to their college life.

Soonyoung had a surprise event planned for Jihoon. He was sure they weren’t going to be getting much homework on their first day back, so he had a date planned. Making sure Jihoon was going to meet him after school, Soonyoung couldn’t wait for the afternoon to come.

Happily skipping around the familiar school hallways, Soonyoung turned the corner to hopefully find Jihoon waiting for him. But the person sitting by the outdoor bench wasn’t Jihoon. 

It was Seokmin.


	17. Your Secret Admirer 17

Soonyoung stopped in his tracks and the smile he had falls off his face. It was going to be super awkward now, since he would have to stick around the area until Jihoon showed up. Of all the people to be where he needed to be, it just had to be one of Wonwoo’s friends.

Seokmin, after hearing the steps of Soonyoung, turns around to see him. A smile makes its way onto his lips, his eyes crinkling up a bit as well. With a small wave, Seokmin said, “Hi.”

Seeing how his face brightened up, Soonyoung couldn’t help but wave back. “Hey.”

“It’s been a while, hasn’t it, Soonyoung,” Seokmin said.

Nodding, Soonyoung agreed, “It has been.”

Seokmin furrowed his brows, “Is there a reason why you are here? Most students are gone for home already.”

“I-I’m waiting for someone,” Soonyoung tells him.

“Ahh,” Seokmin said, nodding, “I see. If you want, you can sit here with me while you wait. I’m also waiting on some friends.”

Seeing no other way out of it, and considering how he promised to meet up with Jihoon here, Soonyoung reluctantly agreed. “Sure.”

Making sure to keep a far enough distance from Seokmin, Soonyoung sat down on the bench. Soonyoung was tempted to take out his phone, to listen to some music, but felt like it would seem rude.

Seokmin was kind of staring at him, and Soonyoung didn’t know what to make of it. He decided to end the awkward moment by asking a simple question. “How have you been?”

With his continuous wide smile, Seokmin said, “The first day of school is always bittersweet. But things are starting to be better. For a while now I’ve been wanting to talk to you.”

Soonyoung frowned, “Why me?”

“Well,” Seokmin started, “I wanted to thank you for being a big part of why Wonwoo and Mingyu are finally together. Seriously, the guys and I were so tired of them playing cat and mouse for such a long time. You really did something to the both of them. Even after Wonwoo stopped talking to you, he was still talking about you.”

Soonyoung couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Wonwoo, his old crush, had actually acknowledged his existence. A few months ago he would have been over the moon with happiness, but now he can’t help but feel slightly sick in the stomach.

Seokmin sighed, “When the talent show was happening, Wonwoo was super worried when you didn’t perform. He blamed himself a lot for things he couldn’t control, honestly. That was one of the reasons why he and Mingyu got into a heated argument. Mingyu was angry, wondering if they should even be a couple when Wonwoo was so worried over some other boy. Which thankfully brought Wonwoo back to reality. They’re a lot better after talking about their issues.”

As much as Soonyoung didn’t want or need to be hearing about Wonwoo’s life, he was glad they were finally happy. Soonyoung let himself smile slightly, “That’s good to hear.”

A chuckle escapes Seokmin, “Telling you about Wonwoo and Mingyu wasn’t the only reason why I wanted to talk to you.”

The look of confusion came back to Soonyoung’s face. Why would Seokmin want to talk to Soonyoung? They’ve only met once.

The wide smile of Seokmin’s returns, and he said, “I’m actually quite glad you didn’t become a thing with Wonwoo. If you did, I probably wouldn’t have been able to hang out with you guys too often. Which would have sucked, cause I kind of sort of really like you.”

Soonyoung didn’t know what to say to something like that. He sat there, blinking in confusion, wondering if he had to say anything at all. Of course he had to say something, he tells himself, he was already happily taken by someone. He was going to have to break Seokmin’s heart.

When Soonyoung was going to tell Seokmin about Jihoon, Seokmin wasn’t looking at him anymore. The guy in front of him was staring past his shoulder. Before Soonyoung could turn around to check what he was staring at, Seokmin had already said the name.

“Woozi?” Seokmin said in confusion.

Soonyoung’s heart dropped. How much did Jihoon hear? Turning around to confirm it, Soonyoung sees Jihoon standing a few feet away, looking at the both of them in a blank stare.

“Jihoonie,” Soonyoung said, standing up to face him.

Before Soonyoung could explain what was going on, Jihoon had already turned and was starting to running away. Dread filled Soonyoung as he watched his boyfriend disappear. How could this have happened?

Quickly turning to Seokmin, Soonyoung tells him, “I’m sorry Seokmin, but that guy running away is my boyfriend. I’m in love with him. I’m sorry. I have to go and find him.”

Without waiting for a reply, and feeling like a jerk, Soonyoung leaves a stunned looking Seokmin. He had more important matters to deal with. His Jihoon never runs away from any kind of situation, so why was he running away now?

 

Soonyoung didn’t have to think too hard when figuring where Jihoon would flee to. Heading in the direction of Jihoon’s house, Soonyoung started to run. While running, Soonyoung couldn’t help but worry about what Jihoon was thinking about. 

Glad he had gone after Jihoon right away, Soonyoung finally caught a glimpse of Jihoon. He was still on the school’s ground, running out of the yard. Sprinting forward, Soonyoung closed in on him.

When Soonyoung was close enough, he wrapped his arms around Jihoon’s torso, pulling him close, making them stop. The first few minutes were spent with them trying to calm their breathing. Then Jihoon grabbed Soonyoung’s hand and tried to pry them away. But Soonyoung wouldn’t let go, at least not yet.

“Let go of me, Soonyoung,” Jihoon said, monotonously.

Soonyoung leaned his chin on Jihoon’s shoulder and said, “I wish I could, but I can’t.”

Jihoon tried to shake himself out of Soonyoung’s grip again, but failed.

“Why are you trying to run away?” Soonyoung asked when Jihoon gives up trying to be freed from him.

A sigh could be heard from Jihoon as he said, “I thought maybe you would want some time alone with him.”

Soonyoung squishes his face in confusion, “It is the opposite. I didn’t want to be there with him, but it was the place I promised to meet you. I couldn’t leave without you.”

Jihoon becomes quiet, thinking over what Soonyoung was telling him. With a whisper, he said, “He said he likes you.”

Not replying right away, Soonyoung snuggled into Jihoon’s neck. “It doesn’t even matter. I already told him my heart belongs to someone else. That someone else is in my arms right now.”

Again, Jihoon is squirming in Soonyoung’s arm.

“Are you still trying to get away from me?” Soonyoung asks.

“No,” Jihoon said, “I’m trying to turn around to face you. But you’re holding on too tight.”

Soonyoung laughs, loosen his hold on Jihoon. Jihoon moves to face Soonyoung, wrapping his own arms around Soonyoung too. 

“Were you jealous?” Soonyoung playfully asked with a smirk.

Jihoon scoffed, “I wasn’t jealous. It was more like I was afraid I wasn’t enough.”

It was Soonyoung’s turn to scoff, “Jihoonie, you are more than enough for me. I don’t need anyone else. I don’t want anyone else. You don’t ever have to worry about me choosing someone other than you. It’s only you.”

Jihoon was quiet before he added, “And you’re sure you’re okay with everyone in school knowing about us?”

Soonyoung leans back to stare at Jihoon, “Everybody has to know. They have to know you’re with me. They know you’re Woozi now. Do you know how jealous I’m going to be when they all find the courage to come up to you, trying to confess their dying love.”

Pink tints Jihoon’s cheeks, “It’s a good thing I’m persistent about the things I’m interested in.”

“It’s a good thing I’m one of those things you’re interested in,” Soonyoung said as he pulled Jihoon back in for another tight hug. 

Silence fills up the void as they take some time to enjoy their embrace. Despite the incident, Soonyoung wanted to savor the moment. Looking around at their surrounding, Soonyoung sees something and his heart starts racing.

Soonyoung begins to chuckle, holding onto Jihoon for support.

“What’s so funny?” Jihoon asked.

“Look,” Soonyoung said, finally pulling away from hugging Jihoon.

Jihoon turns to what Soonyoung was pointing and gasps.

They were standing by the cherry tree. The same exact one where they had first met.

“Have you heard the rumors of this cherry tree?” Soonyoung asked Jihoon, taking hold of his hand.

Jihoon pulls Soonyoung into his side, “Jeonghan-hyung chose this place for me.”

Soonyoung leans down to whisper in Jihoon’s ear, “Any couple who starts their relationship here ends up in a long happy relationship.”

Hearing this, Jihoon smile widely, “It’s a good thing this is where we met then.”

“It is,” Soonyoung said, walking closer to the tree.

“Do you remember that day?” Jihoon asked.

Soonyoung grins, “How could I forget? You made such a huge impact.”

Jihoon stands in front of Soonyoung and grabs his tie.

“Wha-what are you doing, Jihoon?” Soonyoung asks with wide eyes.

Pulling on the tie, Jihoon leans up to whisper into Soonyoung’s ear, “Just giving you a reminder that you are mine.”

Leaning back, Soonyoung is greeted with a smirking Jihoon.

Soonyoung becomes more serious, becoming distracted by Jihoon’s lips. “Are - are you going to kiss me like back then too?”

Jihoon laughs at this, grinning, “Yes I am. That is, unless you don’t want me to.”

Slightly shaking his head, Soonyoung cups Jihoon’s cheeks and leans down.


	18. Your Secret Admirer 18

One year later...

 

“What do you think of this place?” Soonyoung asked, walking over to where Jihoon was standing.

On that particular day, Soonyong was out on a mission with Jihoon, Jun, and Minghao. Their number one mission of the day was searching for a building. The one they were currently in was the sixth option they found and the sixth place they were visiting. Together, they had decided to not make any decisions yet. After scouting all their options, they would come back and choose together. They had to find the best building to fit all their needs.

The whole aspect of his dreams becoming real excited Soonyoung. Every building they’ve gone to seen excited him too. Stepping into each building, Soonyoung could already imagine how the place was going to look and where everything was going to be, and most importantly where he and his friends would be teaching their dance moves. 

Being one step closer to all their dreams, Soonyoung almost wanted to jump around with joy. It seemed he was the only one giddy with excitement throughout the whole entire day. So it was a good choice to have all of them come along with him. Otherwise Soonyoung would have went back only to tell them all the places were a perfect pick.

Jihoon stopped his intense staring of the place to look over at Soonyoung, giving him a small smile, “I like it. I really do. I think Jun and Minghao like the place too.”

The mentioning of the two made Soonyoung wonder where they were. Turning to look for them, Soonyoung catches them walking around the edge of the room walking hand in hand. Seeing them, looking so peaceful and happy in the room, made Soonyoung lighthearted. It was almost like a decision had been made.

“Do you like the place, Soonyoung?” Jihoon asked, bringing back his attention.

Soonyoung smiled to Jihoon and nodded, “I love this place. It’s spacey, it has the right amount of floors we’re looking for, the rooftop is amazing, and it’s close to all the good food places. I think we’re going to love it here.”

Jihoon nodded along with all the points Soonyoung made. “You’re right. We are going to love it here.”

Just as Jihoon was finishing his sentence, Jun and Minghao walked up overed to them. Despite their distracted thoughts over the new place, they knew the whole group had to make the decision. Stopping in front of Soonyoung and Jihoon, the two face them with anticipation and curiosity. 

Without waiting for someone to lead, Minghao tells them right off the bat how he feels, “I like this place. I like it a lot. It’s way better than all the other places we’ve been to. And there’s a good pizza place around the corner. I really like this building.”

Soonyoung couldn’t help but chuckle, “That much?”

Minghao looks at him with puppy eyes, “Yeah. I want this place.”

Jun nods in agreement. “I also think it’s better than the other buildings we’ve seen. We still have to renovate, and the cost of this place is just right for it. It’s everything we want and need. After everything is set in place, we’re going to have a fully functioning dance slash art studio.”

Soonyoung nodded while grinning, “Junnie. Money aside, do you like it?”

Finally a smile grows on Jun’s lips, “Of course I love it. This place is going to be great with all of us in it. I can already see it. Us, dancing here with all the students who want to learn from us. Jihoon painting upstairs. All of us becoming famous here, I cannot wait.”

The realtor walks in, coming up to the group, “Have you guys made up your mind?”

The group smiles to the lady. Jihoon smiled back and said, “We’ll take it.”

 

“We have our first student to sign up,” Soonyoung said, spinning around in a swivel chair. 

Jun and Minghao sat in their own chair, staring at Soonyoung.

“Who is it hyung?” Minghao asked, blinking with curiosity.

Soonyoung smirked, knowing they would love it, “Channie.”

“You mean Lee Chan?” Minghao stared at Soonyoung in growing anticipation, “The kid who used to follow Jeonghan and Jisoo around, and now follows you and Jihoon around like a lost puppy?”

Widely smiling, Sooyoung nods. After knowing Chan all this time, it wasn’t a surprise the kid was going to end up somehow incorporating himself into their daily lives. 

Jun almosted sighed, but he held it in, “He’s going to follow us everywhere we go now.”

With a scrunched up nose, still smiling, Soonyoung tells them, “It’ll be nice to give Jeonghan and Jisoo some time to themselves. He has been following them around for ages. Plus, I’m sure his parents will be fine with him here, safe under Jihoon’s building.”

“I guess you’re right,” Jun said shrugging, not really putting up a fight, “Is there anyone else? It’ll be hard to run a class with only one student.”

Soonyoung frowns, “Even if we only have one student, I would be happy. I’m not going to worry too much about it. Word will be out pretty soon, plus we have our video on it too. Even if we don’t have a full house by the deadline, we’ll have fun with whoever shows up.”

“No matter who shows up, I can’t wait to teach them my moves,” Minghao said, giggling as he spun around in his own chair.

 

Despite how late it was, Soonyoung couldn’t have been any happier than where he was. Especially when he had good friends as company. All the people who have become his second family were hanging out with him, sitting around on the floor of the dance room. 

After dealing with a long busy day, they were sharing a huge serving of chicken and cola. Jihoon’s pick, which Soonyoung happily agreed with.

“This place is pretty great,” Jeonghan said, admiring the painting along the wall side that held no mirrors. The moment Jeonghan stepped into the renovated building, he was raving about all the rooms. Excitingly telling Soonyoung how the angle of each room would make their dance choreography look so much more cool.

Jisoo agreed, “I can see it becoming pretty famous one day.” Already, Jisoo was ready to take on multiple jobs, wanting to edit any video Jeonghan would film, and conversing with Jihoon on collaborating. When Jihoon happily agreed, Jisoo unexpectedly hugged him.

“The place or the people who run the place?” Jun jokingly asked, reaching over for more chicken.

Seungcheol laughs out loud, “It’s most definitely the people. You guys are going to make this place famous. With your dance choreography, people from all over the world are going to want to come here to learn from you guys.”

“People from all over South Korea already want to come here,” Jihoon tells them, drinking from his can of cola.

“One guy,” Soonyoung said next, “One guy from Jeju island. And it was a one time thing. He was just visiting Seoul.”

“But he came here for us,” Minghao continued, “He also promised to one day be back, and to be better too.”

“I’m sure he will be,” Soonyoung said, taking a bite of chicken.

“This reminds me,” Jun said, becoming more serious, “We’ve been talking about adding to the team. Maybe another choreographer so we won’t be so tired, also a receptionist so we won’t have to do all the paperwork ourselves too.”

Soonyoung nodded, “We have been mentioning this for a while now.”

“My pick is Chan,” Minghao shouted, lifting his piece of chicken into the air.

Jun nodded, “Me too. He has the determination, the drive, and the choreography he has come up with is more our style. He’s learnt a lot since the beginning. He even helps to teach the other students when we’re busy with someone else.”

“His parents do like you guys,” Jeonghan tells them, “You guys keep him out of trouble, and they like that they can see what his hobbies are on the internet. He was so embarrassed when he went home and his parents were watching your Youtube videos with him in them.”

Soonyoung chuckles, “But he was so excited to be in them.”

“I’m sure he’s proud,” Jisoo said, “Just very embarrassed.”

“What about a receptionist?” Jihoon asks, getting them back on track.

“There is this guy I know,” Jeonghan volunteers, “He’s a little talkative, but very friendly. I think he would be good with all the people who show up here.”

“Okay,” Soonyoung said nodding, “Bring him in, we’ll talk to him and see if he is a good fit.”

Soonyoung didn’t know how else to describe it. His life was pretty much perfect. Even through all the simple trivial life situations, he was glad to be where he was. He had worked hard for it. And although he was still working hard everyday to improve, he gladly welcomed each new challenge. As long as he had his friends along his side, Soonyoung knew nothing could go wrong.

 

Late one night, Jun and Minghao had left for the day already, and Soonyoung knew one certain artist who had yet to leave. He was also certain the said artist would be hungry. So Soonyoung went out on a search for some food.

When he comes back, he goes to the rooftop, deciding it would be a good place to have a late night dinner. After dropping off the food, Soonyoung heads back into the building to find Jihoon.

In the wide art studio, Soonyoung finds Jihoon quietly painting with slow music playing in the background. Soonyoung knocks on at the door, gaining the attention of Jihoon.

Jihoon looks up and smiles right away. “Come on in.”

“What are you working on?” Soonyoung asks as he walks over to stand by Jihoon.

“An abstract color piece. It’s going to be in my next art show,” Jihoon tells him.

Soonyoung takes a moment to study the piece, “I love it. The colors are amazing.”

“Why didn’t you leave yet?” Jihoon asks, looking up from his chair, “It’s getting late.”

With a frown on his face, Soonyoung said, “You know I can’t leave without you. I have to make sure you get home okay. I also have to make sure you’re eating too. I have some food for us, before we leave for the night.”

“Food?” Jihoon’s eyes widened at the word, “Why didn’t you say. Let’s go, I’ve been kind of hungry for a while now.”

Soonyoung laughs, “Come on.”

Jihoon nods, walking over to a sink to wash his hands.

Once they were ready, Soonyoung leads them to the rooftop. Already, their hands were intertwined with Jihoon swinging them widely, smiling up at Soonyoung.

As soon as Jihoon sees what Soonyoung had brought, he gasps, “Jjajangmyun! We haven’t had it in forever. How did you know it was what I wanted right now?”

Soonyoung chuckled, glad to have bought the noodles. “Let’s hurry, then. We don’t want the noodles to get all soggy.”

Nodding, Jihoon drags Soonyoung over to the wooden floor table. “Hurry, I’m sure you’re hungry as well.”

“I am,” Soonyoung said, pouting, allowing Jihoon to pull him across the rooftop.

The moment they reach the table, Jihoon let’s go of Soonyoung and sits down in front of his claimed bowl.

“It’s food before me now, huh?” Soonyoung joked as he sat down in front of his own bowl.

Jihoon shrugged, “Can you blame me when I’m hungry?”

Laughing, Soonyoung gestured to the food, “Go ahead and eat.”

Eating their food in silence, Soonyoung glanced over to Jihoon every now and then, making sure he was eating everything. He couldn’t believe how much had happened between them. Not all of their memories were good, but Soonyoung wouldn’t of had it any other way.

“If you keep looking at me,” Jihoon said, grabbing noodles with his chopsticks, “then you’re not eating. Do I have to feed you, Soonyoung?”

Hearing Jihoon’s words brought back so many memories. It felt like only yesterday when Jihoon said the same exact words, taking care of a sad and angry Soonyoung. Remembering how thoughtful Jihoon was back then and how he was now, made Soonyoung feel grateful to Jihoon in his life. No matter what was to happen, Soonyoung knew he had to hold onto Jihoon for their whole lives.

Soonyoung smiles at Jihoon, “If it’s coming from you, then of course I’ll eat.”

Jihoon shook his head at how playful Soonyoung was being, but he smiled, “Hurry up and eat.”

After clearing their bowls of all it’s content, they clean up, but they weren’t ready to leave just yet. Soonyoung lays back on the floor table, and Jihoon joins him. With the night sky above them, they couldn’t help but admire the view. 

“Maybe I should just sleep here,” Soonyoung said, “I’m going to end up here in the morning anyways.”

Jihoon giggles, “Should we just have a sleepover once? Invite all the guys with us?”

Soonyoung turns to face Jihoon, “Why do we have to invite the guys? Why can’t it just be us?”

“Just us?” Jihoon asks, “Don’t you think it would be more fun with the others?”

“It could be fun with just us two,” Soonyoung replies.

Sure, Soonyoung would have enjoyed having the guys around, but he kind of wanted some alone time with Jihoon too. He wanted to spend the whole night with Jihoon, talking to him about everything and anything. They already did do that, but they did it through a phone, and Soonyoung wanted something more. Soonyoung wanted to cuddle, to hold, and to be near Jihoon.

“Maybe,” Jihoon said with a turned up eyebrow, “we should just find a place together, near here.”

Hearing this, Soonyoung sits up fast, staring at Jihoon, “Are you serious?”

Soonyoung couldn’t believe what he was hearing. How was it possible for Jihoon to so casually ask something huge like that. Moving in together was a life changing decision, Soonyoung didn’t even know what he wanted to eat for breakfast. 

Jihoon sits up as well, smiling, “I am. We’re already together everyday. Why not live together so we can be together all the time? I’m pretty sure we’ll get annoyed of each other and want to have some alone time, but at least we’ll have our work building to come to.”

Grabbing Jihoon’s hand, Soonyoung said with a pout, “I would never be annoyed with you, or want to be away from you. Even here, just being floors away from you, I want to be with you all the time.”

“So are you saying yes?” Jihoon asks again.

He didn’t have to think about it long. Who cares what he was going to have for breakfast tomorrow. He already knew who he wanted to wake up next to every day for the rest of his life. It was all that mattered in the moment.

Leaning over to place his forehead on Jihoon’s, Soonyoung nods with a smile, “Yes.”


	19. Your Secret Admirer Author's Note

AHHHH!! I thought I would never have finished this story! When I first thought up Your Secret Admirer, the story was supposed to be a short story. But look at it now, 18 chapters! 

Thank you so much to all the readers, whether you were a silent reader or a reader who constantly left comments. I never want readers to feel like they had to leave comments or votes or kudos, so thank you so much if you did. Thank you so much if you subscribed and continued to follow my story to the very end. Thank you for giving my story a chance and enjoying all the crazy ideas I wanted to write.

Seeing how much love this story received, I almost wanted to keep going. Almost. I had to do a reality check and realize I still have so many other stories on hold or ideas I also wanted to write. 

Fun fact: In the first draft, in my thought process, Seokmin was supposed to have a bigger role. During this time though I knew involving Seokmin would have meant more chapters and more angst. So I gave him a small fun cameo.

Seungcheol was supposed to have a bigger role too. But I didn’t want to write another pairing when I wanted my main focus to be SoonHoon.

I can’t say this enough, thank you guys so much.

I learnt so much and received even more while writing Your Secret Admirer.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Jihoon glares, “Don’t you dare leave just yet.”

“Why are you so mad?” Soonyoung pouted, not happy to see how fired up Jihoon was.

“You-you never even got the chance to say you love me,” Jihoon said all flustered. Now mumbling, “How could she forget...”

Soonyoung chuckles, grabbing Jihoon’s cheeks in his hand, “Is that why you’re angry.”

“Never mind,” Jihoon yells out, closing his eyes in frustration, “who cares when they all know it anyways.”

A loud laughter erupts out of Soonyoung, “Jihoonie, Jihoonie, my lovely Jihoonie. I love you so much.”

Jihoon pouts, “This isn’t fair. We should have gotten a whole scene for this. Something where I grab you and force you to say it.”

“Aren’t you doing it right now?” Soonyoung said through giggles.

“This is funny to you isn’t it?” Jihoon said, now glaring at Soonyoung.

Soonyoung, of course couldn’t handle how cute Jihoon was being, so he pulls Jihoon into a hug. “You’re just so cute.”

Jihoon sighs, “Fine, fine. I guess this will have to do.”

Soonyoung pulls away from Jihoon and places his arms across Jihoon’s shoulder. “You haven’t said it back.”

Looking up at Soonyoung, Jihoon wraps his arms around him and pulls him back close. “I love you.”


End file.
